Head doctor unaware of independent report

PORT Moresby General Hospital director of medical services Dr Kone Sobi has informed the coroner’s inquiry into the deaths last year allegedly caused by the use of anaesthetic drug propofol, that he was not aware of the Health Ministry’s independent inquiry report.
He said this when responding to Sir Arnold Amet, who represented the family of the late Rex Wanzing as a friend at the inquest.
Sir Arnold said he raised the question because the doctor was in an administrative position to establish the whereabouts of the report.

Sobi said he was only aware of the internal clinical report that was conducted by the hospital’s board and he could answer questions related to that report.
“The internal report from the hospital has my affidavit and I can answer questions along that but not the independent inquiry report,” he said.
Sobi said on the night of Aug 12, the anaesthesia team realised the adverse drug effect on the patients by 8pm.
He said after receiving several calls from the on-call anaesthesia team “we quickly discussed and realised that it was the batch of propofol that was administered that day to patients during surgery.”
“Propofol is not a new drug, it has been used for many years during surgery without any complications,” he said.
“On Friday, Aug 13, 2021, I was told by the pharmacist that a number of patients had faced adverse effect of the propofol.
“We filled in all the adverse drug reaction (ADR) forms and the samples of the batch of propofol for testing.”

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