A wrong diagnosis marked a 53-year-old Finnish man as dead

Yle reports that a doctor in Pirkanmaa wellbeing services county mistakenly recorded Arska Kallio, 53, as dead during a remote consultation for back pain. The error also added heart conditions to his records that he does not have.

Kallio discovered the entry last Thursday during a dental hygienist appointment. The record showed the code “R99 exitus”, meaning an other ill-defined or unspecified cause of death, alongside a reference to atrial flutter. His patient records also displayed the diagnosis.

The death notice was not sent to Finland’s Digital and Population Data Services Agency, which said it had not received the information. Pirkanmaa wellbeing services county, known as Pirha, said a death notification requires active action and is not transferred automatically. A death certificate would also have been needed for the death to be registered.

Pirha social and health centre director Sari Mäkinen said the doctor had selected the wrong diagnosis code from a long list of closely grouped codes. She called it a human error, apologised and said she had not encountered a similar mistake in her career, describing it as unique.

The record was corrected quickly after the error came to light, and Kallio is now listed as alive. He said he initially felt he had not received immediate advice on what to do, and that the incident briefly affected his sleep. He added that he would have liked a clear apology from Pirha.