Anesthesia Errors

Anesthesia mistakes can be caused by a number of factors. In most anesthesia error cases, a patient is given an overdose of anesthetic medication. In other cases, an anesthesiologist or nurse anesthetist gives a patient a dangerous combination of drugs that results in a serious drug interaction. Anesthesiologists and their nurse counterparts can also cause death or injury when they overcorrect a patient’s adverse medical event during a surgery, such as breathing difficulties or a dangerous drop in blood pressure.

Patients have also died when an anesthesiologist or other medical professional inserted an endotracheal (breathing) tube into the esophagus instead of the windpipe.

The safest place to undergo anesthesia is in a hospital. However, money-saving measures in the health care industry have forced many surgeries into outpatient surgery centers. There are certainly many capable, safe, and well-staffed outpatient surgery centers in this country, but not all of them are equipped to handle emergencies or complex surgeries.

In other cases, a patient dies or suffers a severe brain injury during a procedure in a dentist’s office. There have been many devastating cases of children and young adults suffering cardiac arrest while under heavy sedation or general anesthesia in a dentist’s office.

Anesthesia errors can also occur during non-surgical procedures. Tragic cases like the anesthesia-related death of comedian Joan Rivers during a routine endoscopy shine an important spotlight on the risks of anesthesia. Just because a medical procedure is low-risk or common does not mean it is entirely without risk. A doctor’s error or an anesthesiologist’s mistake can mean the difference between life and death.