In November 2000, a software malfunction led to the deaths of 8 patients at a Panama City oncology clinic, while at least 20 other patients developed symptoms related to overexposure to radiation. The software malfunction led to these patients being overexposed to gamma radiation as part of their radiotherapy while being treated for cancer. The software was supposed to allow doctors to calculate the appropriate radiation dosage for the patient for a given therapy session. He did this by letting the doctor draw on the computer screen the location of the metal shields (called blocks), which serve to protect healthy tissue from harmful radiation. The software would then calculate the appropriate radiation dosage. The problem arose because the doctors wanted to place five separate blocks while the software only allowed the placement of four individual blocks. Doctors found that they could get around this restriction by drawing one large block with a hole in the center instead of five individual blocks. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay What the doctors didn't realize at the time was that, depending on how they drew the hole in the center of the large block, the software would calculate the correct dosage otherwise they would get a dosage twice as much as needed. Doctors were required by law to manually double-check the dosage, but they did not do so and simply used dosages calculated by the software. Several errors were made which led to the death of several patients and the development of serious complications in many other patients. In my opinion, the most obvious mistake was not having followed the procedure and not having rechecked the dosages prescribed by the software. If doctors had taken the time to check the dosages, this could have saved the lives of several people and the system could have had this bug fixed by its developers. The next problem seems to be that the software did not meet the technical requirements that were wanted by the engineers. This could be due to a number of reasons, such as a technology restriction since the accident occurred in 2000 and computer processors may not have been powerful enough to meet the functionality doctors wanted. Another possibility is that there was a lack of communication between the software developers and the doctors. This would explain why the software only allowed a maximum of four blocks to be placed while the doctors who were the desired end users wanted more functionality. Please note: this is just an example. Get a custom paper from our expert writers now. Get a Custom Essay Finally, the company that developed the software could have spent more time testing the software to make sure that any holes drilled into the blocks didn't lead to large changes in the calculated dosages depending on how the hole was drawn. In conclusion, this accident was caused by the doctor's negligence regarding proper medical procedures and a possible lack of testing during software development.