Hospital Authority announces surgical light safety issue
********************************************************
The following is issued on behalf of the Hospital Authority:
The Hospital Authority (HA) spokesman made the following announcement today (February 19) regarding the safety issue of a surgical light:
The HA Head office (HAHO) received report from United Christian Hospital (UCH) yesterday (February 18) regarding the safety issue of a surgical light. An anaesthetic assistant was injured in the shoulder due to an accidental fall of a surgical light in the hospital’s operation room yesterday. The anaesthetic assistant attended the Accident and Emergency Department and was discharged with minor injury. No patient was in the room, amid no other staff nor operation was affected in the incident.
The HA is very concerned about the incident and has notified all hospital clusters to temporarily suspend the use of the surgical light concerned so as to ascertain the safety of patients and staff. The HA has arranged maintenance vendor to immediately conduct a comprehensive inspection of a total of 29 operation rooms equipped with surgical lights of the same model in public hospitals to ensure the surgical lights concerned are safe.
Preliminary findings by the vendor suggested the incident may relate to the conditions of the screws used in the surgical lights. A total of five surgical lights of the same model in UCH were found having similar problem. The vendor will arrange replacement as early as practicable. The vendor is conducting an inspection to all surgical lights of the same brand in public hospitals. The inspection is expected to be completed within a few days. The HA will monitor progress of inspection to minimise the impact.
The HA reiterated that all emergency operations of public hospitals are unaffected. However, some elective operations may need to be rescheduled. Public hospitals will inform patients affected as early as practicable.
UCH has reported the incident to the HAHO via the Advance Incident Reporting System. The HA has entrusted an engineering expert to assist in analysing the cause of the incident and has requested the vendor to conduct an in-depth investigation to identify the root cause of the incident and to submit report afterwards. The HA will follow up the incident with the vendor stringently.
