Patient Dies After Anal Surgery Due to Misdiagnosis... Doctor Unusually Detained After 5 Years

Bleeding from Duodenal Ulcer... Fistula Surgery Underway
"Defendant's Negligence Delayed Accurate Diagnosis, Resulting in Death"

A 40-year-old surgeon, who was the attending physician at the time, was detained in court in connection with an incident where a patient in their 70s died due to a misdiagnosis at a general hospital in Incheon five years ago. Legal circles commented that it is unusual for a doctor to be detained in court due to a medical accident.

On the 25th, Judge An Heegil of the Criminal Division 4 at the Incheon District Court sentenced surgeon A (41), who was indicted without detention on charges of professional negligence resulting in death, to 1 year and 6 months in prison and ordered his detention in court.

Previously, A was indicted on charges of misdiagnosing patient B’s symptoms at a general hospital in Incheon on June 15, 2018, which led to B’s death.

Four days before his death, B explained his symptoms to A, saying, "Recently, every time I have a bowel movement, black blood clots come out." After manually examining the area around B’s anus, A diagnosed him with acute anal fissure (chiru) and performed surgery for chiru four days later. Despite continued bleeding after the surgery, A did not conduct additional endoscopic examinations. Eventually, B collapsed the next day due to anemia and died 11 hours later from hypovolemic shock.

An autopsy revealed that B’s bleeding was caused by a duodenal ulcer, not chiru. At the time, B was taking aspirin due to a previous cerebral infarction, and although A was aware that this medication could cause bleeding in the duodenum, he misdiagnosed the condition as chiru.

Subsequently, the prosecution pointed out that blood test results conducted before the chiru surgery indicated suspected bleeding, but A failed to perform proper tests or treatment and was brought to trial. In court, A claimed, "There was no professional negligence," and "Even if there was negligence, there is no causal relationship with B’s death," but after more than four years of trial, the court concluded that B died because he did not receive appropriate treatment due to A’s misdiagnosis.

Judge An stated, "Another doctor who examined this case opined that if an endoscopic examination had been conducted in a timely manner and bleeding had been stopped, the victim likely would not have died," and added, "The defendant did not take any measures to confirm whether there was duodenal bleeding." Judge An further explained the sentencing by saying, "It is necessary to strictly hold the doctor accountable for neglecting his professional duty of care."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.