SINGAPORE: A student from Jurong West Secondary School was incorrectly diagnosed with COVID-19, after Tan Tock Seng Hospital (TTSH) mislabelled testing samples.
"The original test was undertaken by our laboratory. Subsequently, the student was admitted to NUH and re-tested twice and found to be negative on both occasions. Our laboratory repeated a PCR test on the original sample and the result was negative," said TTSH in a media release on Tuesday (Jul 14).
AdvertisementAdvertisement"Our investigations revealed that there was an erroneous reporting of this case by our laboratory. This arose from a human error in the laboratory where two patients had their specimens cross-labelled."
[h=3]READ: Student at Jurong West Secondary contracts COVID-19, case is linked to another student at the school: MOE[/h]The student is "otherwise well" and has been discharged, said the hospital.
The student, a 13-year-old girl, was last week reported to have contracted COVID-19. According to the Ministry of Education, her case is linked to another student at the school.
AdvertisementAdvertisementTTSH said the other patient, who was in isolation, has since been admitted to NCID and remains stable.
"We have since informed both patients of the mislabelling incident and apologised for the anxiety caused," said TTSH.
"We are sorry for the mistake and sincerely regret the inconvenience caused to our patients and her school," it added.
"We have audited our laboratory testing for COVID-19 for that period and no other mislabelling was discovered. We have also put in place additional checks to prevent such an incident from occurring again."
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