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The brother of a hospital patient who died after he was given the wrong drugs says he was shocked to learn of the errors at Auckland City Hospital that led to Mervin McAlpine's death.
"As far as I was concerned, he went in for a normal admission," Peter McAlpine said yesterday.
"Then to be rung and told they put the wrong drugs into him and they were trying to reverse the situation at the time was quite distressing."
Mr McAlpine, who is 80 and lives in Hastings, said his distress was compounded because he could not get to see his brother before he died.
The two were five years apart and close, and he had taken "every opportunity" he could to visit his brother, who was then 82.
He had travelled to Auckland by bus a couple of times a year, but the visits had increased as his brother's health deteriorated. A diabetic, Mervin had poor blood circulation and had lost both his legs.
Their only other sibling, a brother five years older than Mervin, died 10 years ago.
Peter McAlpine said the Health and Disability Commissioner's report showed that "things could fall through the cracks" at Auckland City Hospital but he understood improvements were being made.
"It's very pleasing to know, because if it can help a situation happening to somebody else, that's the good that can come out of it."
