CALIFORNIA BRIEFING / LOS ANGELES

State health officials fined Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center $25,000 after nurses on Oct. 28 gave a patient blood intended for another person, causing the patient to die.

The patient who died had type O positive blood and was not supposed to receive a transfusion. But two licensed nurses mistakenly gave the patient A positive blood from a transfusion bag intended for another patient. The nurses failed to make sure that the name on the blood bag matched the name of the patient receiving the transfusion.

In a statement, hospital officials said the two nurses were suspended and later quit. The hospital does not plan to appeal the fine. “Everyone at the hospital deeply regrets this incident and the death that it caused,” hospital Chief Executive Jeff Nelson said in a statement.

Last year, Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center settled allegations that it left a paraplegic man with a colostomy bag crawling around downtown Los Angeles’ skid row in a hospital gown by agreeing to pay $1 million and to be monitored by a former U.S. attorney for up to five years.

-- Rong-Gong Lin II