Kaiser Hospital Is Cited After 2nd Death From Double Dose

SAN JOSE —  A Kaiser Permanente patient died last year after receiving too much medication at one of the company’s hospitals, the second patient recently reported to have died under those circumstances at the facility, state health regulators said Wednesday.

The Department of Health Services said a 64-year-old man at Kaiser Permanente Santa Clara Medical Center died Dec. 24 after receiving a double dose of stroke medication. His identity was not disclosed.

The hospital was cited for being “deficient” in the man’s care by failing to properly check the dosage, officials said.

In August, the same hospital was cited in the death of Josephine Frances Hart, 12, who received a double dose of pneumonia medication.

In both cases, the state approved the hospital’s plan to require that nurses double-check medications. Health officials said the incidents were “isolated” within different units and did not represent a systemic failure that would justify revoking the hospital’s license.

Health department spokesman Scott Vivona said the citations did not bring fines, and there was no limit to the number of citations a hospital could receive before its license was revoked. Cited hospitals are required to devise plans to correct the problems that led to the deaths, he said. The plans must be approved by the state.

“We take very seriously our responsibility to learn from these errors and to improve the training of our providers and the reliability of our systems,” Kaiser said in a prepared statement. “We accept full responsibility for the medication error and have added additional safeguards to our pharmacy and medication practices.”

This month, Kaiser Permanente Santa Teresa Medical Center in San Jose was cited for a similar infraction.

Chemotherapy patient Christopher Wibeto, 21, died in August, three days after a cancer-fighting drug intended for another patient was injected into his spine.

Under an agreement with the health department, the hospital now requires that a doctor, nurse and pharmacist verify that the correct medication is being administered to patients.