Hospital worker 'gave wrong blood to child'

A hospital scientist put a critically-ill child at risk after issuing the wrong blood for a transfusion, a conduct hearing has been told.

Amjad El Sayed Omar, who speaks limited English, failed to own up to his mistake and did not inform his managers of what happened following the blunder at Stafford Hospital in March last year. The Health Professions Council was told Omar, of Sidmouth Avenue, Stafford, noticed the tag on the blood clearly identified another patient but went ahead anyway.

Colleagues at the hospital then phoned him to double-check but Omar gave clear assurances that all was well.

It took another two hours for the biomedical scientist to realise his error, by which time 25 per cent of the blood had been administered to the child.

Omar then discarded the rest of the blood but failed to own up to the mistake.

An investigation later found Omar had been working for more than five months without being registered with the HPC.

Vicky Lord, for the HPC, said Omar was working in the haematology department at the time of the incident on March 18 last year.

When he arrived for the night shift he was briefed about two deliveries of blood expected that evening, one of which was "urgently needed" for a child.

She said: "At 5.30pm, there was a delivery. Mr Omar called the children's ward and told staff the blood was ready for collection. He was aware the blood wasn't labelled correctly but went ahead with issuing it.

"He assumed it had been labelled incorrectly by the National Blood Service."

Ms Lord said his mistake became apparent when the NBS called to say the blood was on its way.

Omar rang the children's ward and told them to immediately stop the transfusion. He then asked for the blood to be returned to him.

Ms Lord said: "The following day he discarded the blood and went off duty. He didn't inform members of staff about the incident."

Mid Staffordshire Trust investigated the matter and Omar admitted the blunder was "100 per cent" his fault.

The hearing continues.