Of Malpractice in the Medical World

I was in teaching today, learning about pneumothoraxes(air in d chest,causing ur lungs to collapse) and effusions(likewise but with fluid) in the chest.

And then my consultant said to me. When he was a 5th year medical student, there was this over eager doctor that aspired to be a cardiothoracic surgeon. He insisted on doing all the clinical procedures and one day was about to insert a chest drain into a patient with a pneumothorax. That's inserting a tube into the chest to drain the air out from the chest so ur lung can re-expand.

So this Very Eager Doctor stuck the tube in.

And to his utmost dismay, I would say, the tube started beating to the patients pulse. He had pierced the left ventricle(the compartment that pumps blood all around your body) of the heart with it. Blood started coming out of the tube.

What do you do? The only ONLY smart thing he did was not to pull the tube out. Should he have pulled it out, the patient would have immediately bleed to death.

So, patient was carted off to the theater where the surgeons tried to patch the hole in the heart as they pulled the tube out. But, he didn't make it.

Naturally, so-mentioned Very Eager Doctor's cardiothoracic future came to a staggering Halt.

And then, i remember this other story.

Another freshly graduated doctor was about to perform a lumbar puncture. What's a lumbar puncture you ask. that is when a doctor sticks a needle into your spinal cord to get spinal fluid, which is really fluid from your brain as it runs all the way down the spine. Correct me if I am wrong. I said that I will cheat my way thru medical school so trivial details like this does not concern me.
There are tonnes of nerve endings there. You know how you can move your limbs? All thru this lovely nerve tracts that run up your spine.

Anyway.

Freshly graduated doctor puts the needle in and in the process disrupts the nerve roots.

Leaving the patient paralysed waist down.
Likewise, that was the end of his medical career.

But, I think.

Doctors are only human aren't they?