'Dead' octogenarian found still alive in hospital morgue pronounced dead again

The nightmare of waking up in a morgue became reality for 81-year-old Zinaida Kononova. After surgery to remove an intestinal obstruction, the woman was declared dead. Her body was taken to the hospital morgue in Kursk, Russia on Friday, August 14. She was eventually found alive by a nurse the following morning. The octogenarian was taken to a different hospital where she went under treatment for a few days. She eventually died after failing to recover from the ordeal of the surgery and waking up in a morgue. The incident is being investigated.

Kononova's niece Tatiana Kulikova received a call the day after her aunt was pronounced dead informing her of the strange revelation. The startled woman was happy to hear that her aunt was actually alive.

The elderly woman was moved from Gorshechenskaya Central Regional Hospital to another hospital in the region. She was kept in the intensive care unit but even after further medical assistance, she eventually succumbed and was declared dead a second time. The ordeal reportedly left her with severe loss of memory before her death.

An investigation was launched into the unfortunate incident. It was revealed that after the surgery to remove an intestinal blockage, she was "biologically dead." According to the Daily Mail, the doctors tried for nearly 30 minutes to revive her. After one hour 20 minutes, her body was transferred to the morgue. The doctors did not wait for two hours as per the medical guidelines.

She was taken to the morgue around 1:10 am local time. It is believed that she regained consciousness sometime later. She tried to escape the morgue but only managed to fall off the examination table. At around 8 am local time, she was discovered in a critical state by a nurse.

Following the incident, the chief of the hospital has been suspended for suspected negligence. The family is planning to sue the hospital for the ordeal faced by Kononova. The state authorities are investigating the incident.

According to The Independent, many regional hospitals lack equipment that can measure brain activity. Doctors rely on observable factors to assess signs of life. Even though the circumstances in which Kononova was misdiagnosed has not been revealed, it could be due to the lack of infrastructure that contributed to the incident.