Sydney doctor misdiagnoses TB patient
Ten people were infected with tuberculosis after a Sydney doctor misdiagnosed a 23-year-old man with asthma then lung cancer, leaving him without proper treatment for three months.
But Director of Communicable Diseases at NSW Health, Vicky Sheppeard, has denied to News Corp that there has been an "outbreak" of TB.
After months without treatment, X-rays later found the man had a six centimetre hole in his lung.
A man with TB was misdiagnosed as having asthma and then lung cancer. Photo: 7 News
During this time he was highly contagious and infected 10 people with the disease.
The man had gone to a GP several times, but was at first told that he had asthma.
News Corp reports that Patient Zero, who is a university student, was told by his Chippendale-based GP that his persistent cough, shortness of breath and general malaise was likely lung cancer and sent immediately to Royal Prince Alfred Hospital on October 21.
Tests at the hospital confirmed he had a slightly drug resistant strain of tuberculosis.
Dr Sheppeard said TB should be suspected in people with persistent coughs for longer than three weeks.
But she said there was no current investigation into the doctor's misdiagnosis because a "complaint" had not yet been made.
"Public announcements about people with TB disease are rarely necessary as TB is not spread by brief, casual exposures,” Dr Sheppeard said.
“NSW has one of the lowest rates of TB in the world.”
The patient, who has not been identified, was in isolation at RPA for three weeks and then spent a further eight weeks in isolation at home.
He is still taking antibiotics now and has to go to hospital every weekday morning to receive his drugs.
"I just felt like I had a really bad flu that wouldn’t go away,” he told News Corp.
“I was otherwise still myself and was even surfing three times a week.”
He said those infected included members of his family and also people he worked and studied with and he was scared of the wider community finding out he was infected.
The other 10 patients are also undergoing treatment.
The patient was kept in isolation at the Royal Prince Alfred hospital for several weeks. Photo: AAP
The diagnosis fail follows a long list of controversies for NSW Health including two newborn babies being given the wrong gas at a Bankstown-Lidcombe hospital and a fake doctor working in a number of hospitals for a decade and several others.
The scandals eventually lead to the resignation of former health minister Jillian Skinner.
TB is a nationally notifiable disease, and can be a very serious disease if not diagnosed early and treated.
The Federal Department of Health is now investigating the incident.
Newsbreak – March 27
