Cardiac arrest patient not given certain drug because of time needed to get it from hospital pharmacy, Hong Kong inquest hears
- Yau Ming-poon, 74, died in Tuen Mun Hospital, three days after he was admitted for breathing difficulties
- Doctor tells inquest that patient was given drug to lower his blood pressure, but it might have had side effects on his lungs
An elderly asthma patient was not given a certain medicine before his death in a Hong Kong hospital because it would have taken too long to obtain the drug in an emergency, an inquest heard on Tuesday.
Yau Ming-poon, 74, died in Tuen Mun Hospital on May 16, 2016, three days after he was admitted for breathing difficulties.
The inquest at West Kowloon Court heard that Yau suffered cardiac arrest twice in the hospital’s intensive care unit. The first time, his breathing tube was found unattached to the respirator. Before his death, Yau had a second cardiac arrest after his family suspected the doctor had wrongly inserted a breathing tube into his digestive tract.
Doctor Lam Ki-wai told the hearing that three hours before the patient’s death at 5.27am, he had given Yau a drug named labetalol to lower his blood pressure, but it might have had side effects on his lungs.
Lam admitted that while a drug called esmolol had fewer after-effects, it was only available in the hospital’s pharmacy. It would have taken half an hour for Lam to go through sterilisation procedures in and out of the ICU and to walk between different buildings to get the drug, a risk he did not want to take in an emergency.