Two children dead after undergoing routine medical procedures at Canadian hospital

A Canadian hospital is pausing scheduled tonsil and adenoid surgery for patients under 18 after two children who underwent the procedure died just after being discharged, officials said last week. 

McMaster Children’s Hospital in Hamilton, Ontario treated both patients, Hamilton Health Sciences said in a June 7 statement. One child passed away the day after their surgery, while the second died nine days after the procedure.

One died in May and the other in June. 

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Dr. Devin Peterson, chief of pediatric surgery at the hospital, said the pause was made out of an abundance of caution and hospital officials were “deeply saddened” by the deaths. 

“This is a very rare occurrence,” he said in a video message. 

The deaths don’t appear to be connected, officials said. The cause of deaths for both patients has not been determined. 

The Canadian Society of Otolaryngology says a tonsillectomy is considered a major surgery. 

“The main risk is bleeding, which can be serious. About 5% of patients bleed after surgery (and might need to return to the operating room to have the bleeding stopped),” the hospital statement said.

Most bleeds occur seven to 10 days after surgery, but rarely occur as late as 17 days after the procedure, it said. 

Last year, the hospital performed 584 pediatric tonsil-only or tonsillectomy with adenoid surgeries,” it said. The rate of patients who returned to the emergency department was around 5.8%, comparable to the expected rate reported by the Canadian Society of Otolaryngology.

“Patient safety is the most important priority at our hospital and we will only resume scheduled surgeries once the review is complete,” the hospital said. “We recognize that this is a difficult message for our patients and families.”

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