St. Petersburg, Fla.-based Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital apologized April 22 for mistakenly inviting at least one family who lost a child to cancer to a Cancer Survivor Day, reports NBC affiliate WFLA.
Holly Wade's son Daniel was a patient at All Children's for two and a half years before he died from a brain tumor in 2006. Ms. Wade said she received an envelope addressed to Daniel in the mail on April 22.
"I open it up and find out it's a celebration for surviving a disease he succumbed to," she told WFLA. "Clearly mistakes were made. It was very upsetting."
A spokesperson for All Children's could not confirm whether other families who lost children also received invitations. The hospital shared the following statement with WFLA:
"We are very sorry to learn about this clerical error. Our staff are working to understand how this occurred," the hospital said April 22. "We have checks and rechecks in place to ensure something like this doesn't happen, but our team is devastated to learn that our system failed in this case. We are reaching out personally to express our apologies and deep disappointment about this situation."