Mar 20, 2008 4:37 pm US/Pacific
Cedars-Sinai Slapped With $25K Fine Over Overdose
LOS ANGELES
-
-
Actor Dennis Quaid, with his wife Kimberly Buffington, receives a Star On The Hollywood Walk Of Fame on Hollywood Blvd on Nov. 16, 2005 in Hollywood, Calif.
Frazer Harrison/Getty Images
The state fined Cedars-Sinai Medical Center $25,000 Thursday for giving overdoses of an anti-coagulant to three infants, including Dennis Quaid's newborn twins.
The California Department of Public Health found that hospital personnel failed to adhere to established policies and procedures for safe medication use, resulting in "preventable medication errors."
Thomas Boone and Zoe Grace, who were 10 days old at the time, were given an overdose of Heparin on Nov. 18. According to the hospital, three patients mistakenly received doses of 10,000 units per milliliter instead of the normal dosage of 10 units. The patients were all treated and did not show any ill effects from the overdose, according to hospital officials.
Heparin is an anti-coagulant used to clean out IV tubes to prevent blood clots.
Dr. Michael L. Langberg, the hospital's chief medical officer, said after the overdose that a pharmacy technician at Cedars-Sinai stored the higher dosages of Heparin in the wrong place, so the nurse who grabbed the medicine to administer it to the babies mistakenly administered the wrong dosage. The nurses who administered the medication also failed to follow hospital policy by administering the drugs without verifying the dosages. Langberg admitted that the overdose was a result of an error by the hospital staff, and he apologized to Quaid and his wife, Kimberly Buffington, and the family of the other infant who received an overdose.
Quaid and Buffington have filed a lawsuit against Heparin's manufacturer -- Illinois-based Baxter Healthcare -- in December, claiming it failed to change the medication's labels to prevent confusion over dosages.
In the lawsuit, Quaid and his wife the packaging of the lower and higher dosages of Heparin are similar, making it easy for mix-ups to occur, and the company failed to correct the problem despite other reported cases of patients receiving the wrong dosage.
(© 2008 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Wire services contributed to this report.)
Click to enlarge
Stumble It!
