Almost 100 California residents are being harmed in hospitals in adverse events thought to be preventable.

Records reveal the astonishing fact that during a 10-month period doctors performed a wrong surgical procedure, on the wrong part of the body or on the wrong patient 41 times. Moreover, for 145 times foreign objects such as surgical equipment have been forgotten in patients’ bodies.

According to California Department of Public Health, these alarming mistakes doctors made are among the 1,002 severe medical harm cases which occurred between July 2007 and May 2008 in hospitals across the state.

In October, a technician wrongly connected a ventilator hose, pumping oxygen by mistake into the lungs of a 9-day-old baby. Several weeks later, technicians at Santa Cruz’s Dominican Hospital misplaced a CT scan of one patient into the electronic file of another one, the unfortunate consequence being surgeons removing the wrong individual’s appendix.

These incidents are officially called “adverse events” but they are also known as “never events”, for the reason that they could never happen, being preventable.

Legislators and hospital organizations from no less than 7 states agreed to guarantee protection to patients by not having to reimburse the price of incorrect care. An assemblyman from Sacramento suggested a restriction on reimbursing hospitals for injuries tracked down by the state.

Behind patient injuries, other important aspect hospitals confront with concern the overcrowded emergency rooms. At Kaiser Foundation Hospital San Jose in March, a patient was left waiting in an emergency room for more than an hour, although doctors concluded that he needed urgent care. Because all treatment bays were occupied, the patient died in the waiting room.