Officials from Northern Health announced on Wednesday that a step in the process of cleaning their endoscopes for procedures like colonoscopy, upper gastric scope, endoscopaboic retrogradechlangiopancreatogram and other invasive procedures was not properly done.
It was discovered that since 2012, this error has been happening over and over again in thousands of patients. The error was discovered by a member of the hospital staff in December 2014. For two years, they have unknowingly commited the same mistake that may potentially cause severe infection to their patients.
When the error was discovered, it has been corrected to prevent complications that might arise from it. The Northern Health and health department officials are in the process of informing all patients about the incident. However, they are not offering any follow up or treatment for it.
Since there are thousands of patients who had undergone procedures using these improperly cleaned endoscopes, there is only minimal infection incurred, Dr. Ron Chapman, Northern Health's vice president of medicine said.
He added, "Our data tracking of infectious diseases shows no increase of specific infection types during the 2012 to 2014 time period. The consultation with B.C. Centre for Disease Control did not recommend testing for any infectious diseases given the extremely low, low risk."
However, he said that even if there's only a small risk on complications and infection, it is still crucial for the company to be honest of their mistake and apologize for any undue stress to their patients.
"Ultimately we took the step of sharing this information with patients and their physicians this week because it is the right thing to do. Even though this is minimal risk to the patients, this information is about their personal health and well-being and we believe it is information that they would want to have," Chapmen added.
Sterilization is very important to consider when performing invasive procedures. One of the predicaments doctors are preventing is sepsis which can be fatal if not treated immediately.
Anyone with immediate concerns can contact Northern Health at 1-844-565-5516 or endoscopes.info@northernhealth.ca.
