FUKUSHIMA (Kyodo) A doctor in Okuma, Fukushima Prefecture, was arrested Saturday on suspicion of professional negligence resulting in the 2004 death of a woman on which he had performed a Caesarean section, police said.
Police alleged that Katsuhiko Kato, 38, performed a Caesarean on the woman at Fukushima Prefectural Ono Hospital on Dec. 17, 2004, without transferring her to a hospital with better facilities and staff, even though he knew she was suffering from an adherent placenta and that the procedure could lead to considerable blood loss.
The woman died of massive blood loss after the operation.
Kato also allegedly violated the Medical Practitioners Law by failing to report the death to police.
He has denied some of the allegations against him, according to investigators. Police said they decided to arrest him over the failure to notify police and that they feared he might destroy evidence.
The hospital said it did not report the incident to police because it did not see it as a mistake immediately after the surgery.
Kato received his doctor's license in 1996 and began working in the obstetrics and gynecology department at Ono Hospital in April 2004. He was the only doctor in that section of the 150-bed hospital, which was established in 1951.
The prefecture made the accident public last March. It said Kato had made a mistake in judgment, apologized to the woman's family and punished the doctor with a one-month pay cut.
Police only came to know of the incident after the prefecture's announcement. They searched the hospital in April, and on Saturday investigators also searched the hospital bureau of the prefectural government office.