OSAKA, Japan, Jan. 27 (UPI) -- Hospital officials in Osaka, Japan, say they've apologized to a heart-transplant patient who received the wrong medication after a blood-sample mix-up.
After receiving the medication, the woman suffered a drop in her white blood cell count, the result of a mistake by a technician at the National Cardiovascular Center, The Yomiuri Shimbum reported Tuesday.
The woman was one of 12 patients -- 10 of them heart-transplant recipients -- whose blood samples were misidentified last October by the technician, the hospital said.
The hospital had yet to notify the other 11 patients of the mistake, though no abnormalities had been reported in those patients, said Hiroaki Naito, a hospital spokesman.
The hospital has made changes to its laboratory procedures to prevent future mistakes, he said.
