Surgical instrument left in patient discovered after five months

Czech doctors left a foot-long surgical instrument in a Czech woman's abdomen during gynecological surgery in September 2009. Their colleagues found the instrument in her body after five months.

The woman complained repeatedly about the pain she had been suffering since the surgery but it took five months to doctors to find out that their colleagues made an almost tragic mistake. Zdenka Kopeckova, 66, commented:

I said that nobody helps me and I cannot live like this till the end of my life. I told the head surgeon that if I had no pain I would not be complaining. I'm not a hypochondriac.

Kopeckova plans to sue for compensation. Jaromir Hrubes, Ivancice hospital director, stated:

The medical procedures at Ivancice seem perfect at the first sight, there is documentation and list of instruments used, but the person who did the evaluation did not report the missing object.

Head surgeon Ales Skopal who made a surgery expressed his apologies. He added that the nurse who was in charge of instruments during operation is responsible:

She ought to have noticed the mistake.

Regional official Michal Hasek apologized to Kopeckova and said that the region as owner of the clinic plans to compensate the failure.