Nearly 600 COVID-19 vaccine doses lost through freezing error at Kansas hospital
Update: The Kansas Department of Health and Environment said Friday it will replace the nearly 600 doses of COVID-19 vaccine that had been mishandled. Read that story here.
An error during the transfer of COVID-19 vaccines from the Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health Department to the LMH Health hospital in Lawrence led to the loss of nearly 600 doses, the health department said Thursday.
In a news release, the health department said 570 doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine had to be discarded because they were mistakenly refrozen after being thawed.
The health department and hospital were working to reschedule vaccine appointments, which will likely be planned for Wednesday at the Douglas County Fairgrounds.
The vaccine doses had arrived to the health department in a refrigerated state on March 3 and were transferred to the hospital a week later. Not realizing the doses were already thawed, the hospital placed them in a freezer. Typically, vaccines are delivered while frozen and are kept that way until they are ready to be administered, the health department said.
“When we discovered the vaccines had been delivered to the hospital in a refrigerated state, LMH Health immediately reached out to Johnson & Johnson for guidance,” said Brian Bradfield, LMH Health associate vice president of ancillary services. “The company advised these doses will have to be discarded.”
LMH Health president and chief executive Russ Johnson said while measures are in place to prevent waste of the vaccine, the hospital failed in this case. Its vaccination team was working to review and refine the process to prevent future errors. He called it a “heart wrenching situation” for those involved in administering the doses, and for the community.
“We owe it to our community and to the many volunteers and staff who pour their hearts into the vaccination effort to see this through in a manner that is both efficient and effective,” Johnson said. “We have had a nearly flawless process to date and we will determine where our processes failed and fix them. What we learn will be shared with our community partners to prevent issues down the road.”
Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health director Dan Partridge referred to the error as a “bump in the road” and said it was a single process that had deviated from the norm.
“This is a good reminder for all Unified Command partners to check and double check their doses during transfer,” Partridge said.
This story was originally published March 12, 2021 at 11:31 AM.
