This article appeared in the Sunday St. Paul Pioneer Press:




Breasts removed in error
Staff and wire reports

A St. Paul hospital apologized publicly Saturday for a laboratory mix-up that resulted in the amputation of a healthy Wisconsin woman's breasts after she was mistakenly told she had cancer.

Dr. Daniel Foley, medical director of United Hospital, told KARE-TV in a report broadcast Friday night that the hospital had made changes so "this kind of mix-up would never happen again."

Linda McDougal, 46, said she was diagnosed with cancer in May after her doctor had a biopsy performed when a suspicious spot appeared on her mammogram.

McDougal said she was told the cancer was so aggressive that a double mastectomy, chemotherapy or radiation were her only chances for survival. In June, she had the surgery.

Hospital spokeswoman Terri Dresen said that McDougal was diagnosed with a malignant tumor and the mastectomy was one of several options McDougal had to choose from for treatment.

Two days after the surgery, McDougal was recovering when her doctor visited. "She had bad news," said McDougal, who is from Woodville, Wis. "She didn't know how to tell us other than to just tell us, and immediately I thought I was dying, and she told me I didn't have cancer."

After finding no malignancy in the amputated breast tissue, McDougal said her doctor discovered a mistake in the laboratory. Tissue from McDougal's biopsy was switched with tissue from another woman.

On Saturday, United issued a statement: "Clearly there was a mistake and full disclosure was made as soon as the pathologist realized the error. We want to make it clear our doctors acted on good faith on the pathology information. … All our patients are important to us. We provide excellent care at United Hospital. In fact, Mrs. McDougal continues to receive care here and we appreciate the trust she is giving us."

Foley said the woman who actually had the cancer has been contacted and treated. He would not identify the pathologist at fault, but said the doctor still practices at United. The doctor was told such mistakes were not acceptable, Foley said.

"If you're right 99.999 percent of the time, you don't want to be that .01 percent because the consequences are serious, and we have to be right 100 percent of the time," Foley said.

Although United has a complete pathology lab, the hospital has no pathologists on staff. Instead, it hires an outside medical pathology group to come in and perform pathology exams on tissue samples, Dresen said.

"It's traditional in the medical community,'' she said. "Doctors have outside medical practices and come into the hospitals to do their work.''

Dresen said such errors are "very, very rare." She said the lab processes hundreds of samples a week and, as far as she knows, such a mix-up has never occurred before.

Since the incident, hospital officials have done an extensive review of its systems and the pathology group's systems, Dresen said. "Additional safeguards have been added to prevent errors like this from happening again,'' she added.

An attorney representing United's pathologists said the group's insurance company has paid McDougal's medical expenses and lost wages, and will continue to do so.

McDougal said she is fighting several infections and must still undergo several reconstructive surgeries before she decides whether to sue for malpractice.



Here is a follow up article:






World audience told of mastectomy error
BY LISA DONOVAN
Pioneer Press

What happened to Linda McDougal at a St. Paul hospital is a story that Monday made its way into homes across the country and possibly the world.

On the sets of the "Today" show, "Good Morning America" and several other national television programs, McDougal repeated the facts: a medical lab mix-up resulted in the removal of the healthy woman's breasts after she was mistakenly told she had cancer.

"It has taken me seven months to be able to talk about this," she said during a telephone interview from a New York hotel room. "But I believe I have a message for all women, and you know, not all women, but men, too: You need to take charge of your own health care. You have to seek out a second opinion. How many people would question a pathology report? I did not."

Officials at United Hospital, where McDougal underwent the operation, apologized publicly last week. Dr. Daniel Foley, the hospital's medical director, has said United had made changes so "this kind of mix-up would never happen again."

But McDougal said that's just a "public relations" ploy that came after she went to the media with her story. McDougal was scheduled to board a flight back to the Twin Cities on Monday night after an interview with Connie Chung on CNN.

The 46-year-old accountant from western Wisconsin said she was diagnosed with cancer in May after a suspicious dark spot appeared on her mammogram and her doctor had a biopsy performed. McDougal said she was told the cancer was so aggressive that a double mastectomy, chemotherapy or radiation were her only chances for survival.

She never felt ill, never felt a lump. But in June, she underwent surgery.

The three weeks between diagnosis and surgery were a frightening whirl of talking to doctors, giving her husband and three children, ages 15, 17 and 28, the news and feeling an impending sense of doom.

"Cancer is just the 'C' word — you automatically see a death sentence," she said. "It was just like a black fog follows around you. You immediately think of planning a funeral, writing a eulogy. You can't imagine what goes through your mind."

Days after the surgery, she was recovering in the hospital when a surgeon told her the news. As it turned out, she did not have cancer.

McDougal and her husband were stunned. She can't pinpoint the date, but she remembers a conversation she had with her then-14-year-old son after getting the news about the mix-up. "He said, 'But Mom, you don't have cancer.' I think he was so relieved, he couldn't figure out why we were so upset," McDougal said. "It took him saying that, that I started to understand, 'OK, maybe I don't have cancer.' "

While that didn't change what happened to her physically, the events of the past few months have altered her life forever, according to McDougal and her husband, Gerald.

"At first, she would just look in the mirror to get dressed in the morning, and she'd cry. Picking out clothes to go to dinner or a movie, it was hard for her," said Gerald McDougal, 41.

"We've learned to take things in stride, and this has definitely brought us closer together," he said. "About a year ago, I broke my leg and it was a very bad break. I wasn't able to walk on it and finally I had to have my foot amputated two months ago. And let me just say, this was easy compared to what she went through."

Linda McDougal hated to even leave the house after the surgery.

"Well, what happened to me — it's part of my sexuality. And you say, Why don't I want to go far from home? Because I feel freakish. I can't wear certain clothes or clothes don't fit right," McDougal said.

"I live in a small town, so word travels fast. If I go to a store, a complete stranger will hug me and say, I'm sorry about what happened to you," she said of Woodville, a 45-minute drive east of St. Paul on Interstate 94. "That's Small Town, U.S.A."

But now the couple talk about seizing the moment, doing things they've always wanted to do and appreciating the time they have together.

The woman who actually had the cancer attributed to McDougal has been contacted and treated. And the pathologist at fault still practices at United, hospital officials said. The doctor has been told such mistakes are unacceptable.

That is not enough for McDougal, who has several surgeries behind her and more reconstructive procedures ahead as a result of the mistake. She has hired a lawyer, who accompanied her to New York for the whirlwind interview tour. "I want justice with respect to the doctor — and that's kind of harsh, the way that sounds," she said. "Let's just say I want accountability, and what that exactly is, I'm not sure."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

This has to be the saddest story I've read in a long time. I can't even imagine how mad I would be.

Yeah! I was watching them interview her last night!

She is only "considering" taking them to court and suing? :O

Is she NUTS? I am not sue-happy, but there definately needs to be punative damages for what they did to her.

In fact, I'd be suing for millions - a lesson to not make this sort of mistake again...sheesh

I cannot begin to imagine what this has done to her, and will continue to do for the rest of her life.




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[This message was edited Tue Jan 21 6:31:24 PST 2003 by LaVisHh]

Not only would I sue, I'd kill everyone in that damn hospital.

Sure makes the Are You Happy with Your Breasts thread seem a bit...well...silly, huh?

Poor woman!

OceanaOne said:

Wanna know what a "poor woman" is?
Check this out:

http://www.prince.org/msg...&tid=33409

I bet u can relate!

Irish,,I would not waste my time going to any link you give...and STOP following me around please

OceanaOne said:

You MUST like me..you just DONT know how to show it ... Go look at all of my posts and THERE IS IRISH ...Now RdHuLL I can handle he has a cute lil Felix

LaVisHh said:

Precisely. You can't treat incompetents like that with kid gloves. Their carelessness was way too serious to pussyfoot around trying to figure out how to handle the situation. She should sue for as much as possible.

TRON said:

I'd help you!

OceanaOne said:

I am a Gecko.
I am attracted 2 bad smells...

OceanaOne said:

U right
I love ignorance
and the people who carry it
but u wrong
I DO know how 2 show it
I'm doin it all the time in my posts 2 you

This was truly sad.

That is so frightening. I had surgery for the possibility of breast cancer. So scary.

I feel very sorry for her, however, I'm glad she is not dying.

Compensation is the least that needs to be done.

This is a good lesson in being responsible for your health and health care. ALWAYS get a 2nd opinion. If they had told me "we are going to remove both breasts", I would have had 2 more opinions first. Especially if i didn't feel a lump...

I hope her life get's back on track

Turly scary that this could occur in this day and age.

Turly scary that this could occur in this day and age.

I saw this on the news last night, too.

She NEEDS to sue, and make those responsible for this horrible situation accountable for their carelessness.

I agree about the second opinion(s), as well, and it's crucial in the more serious situations such as surgery or certain medications. I've had a lot of dealings with doctors and hospitals in my life, and one thing I've learned in the process is to be diligent and informed, and watch out for yourself and your own healthcare. Too many people just take the doctor's word as gospel without doing the research they should.

My heart goes out to this lady.

This is a horrible tragedy. According to the articles, the responsible pathologists and/or the team responsible for collecting and labelling the biopsied tissue are the ones to blame - not the hospital or the surgeon (as some have indicated here). A terrible mistake was made in the handling of the tissue. It appears to have had nothing to do with surgical negligence.

In my view, a second opinion alone would NOT have prevented this error. Any surgeon seeing this patient to offer a second opinion would have read the same, erroneous pathology report. If bilateral mastectomy was the best treatment for the cancer described in the pathology report, then the same surgery would have been scheduled by the surgeon offering a second opinion.

It would have been VERY rare for a patient to undergo a second, painful biopsy procedure as part of obtaining a second opinion. That's not how the system works. A second biopsy would only be considered if there was a reason to question the first - poor tissue quality or equivocal histological findings. That appears not to have been the case here.

I am amazed at how quickly people condemn medical professionals. If others were held to standards as high as those of most medical professionals, the world would be a better place.

TheMax said:

Those are very good points and are all true, but it still doesn't bring back the girls breasts.

I almost never have reason to go to the Doctor, but I have faith in the health care system and realize that this story is a one in a billion type of thing and I don't worry about it happening to me.

now stupid pres bush is trying to limit the amount of money she could get for this too two thousand five houndred dollers which comes out to about 52 cents after she pays her lawyers, not even taking into cosideration the rehibilitation cost or lost wages and such...who the f put him in office anyways.lets not make that mistake again.

mpls777 said:

I am actually in favor of limitations on the amount of money patients can sue for. Juries get too emotional and hand out HUGE settlements which raises the cost of insurance to the hospital and either results in poorer care or higher costs for me.

BTW the $250,000 is the limit on pain and suffering and the patient can still get money for rehibiliation, lost wages, and such as you put it.

TheMax said:

Whatever it had to do with it WAS negligent. And that alone gives her the right to sue whoever was responsible.