Doctors in the Czech Republic carried out an abortion on the wrong patient after a terrible mix-up.

The expecting mother went to the hospital for a check-up on 25 March, but instead was sent for a curettage – a procedure to remove tissue, including a foetus, from the womb.

Another woman was supposed to have had the abortion but medical staff – including a doctor, gynaecologist, nurse, and an anaesthesiologist – mixed up the identities of the women due to a language barrier.

A source who did not wish to be identified told news outlet Prahain.cz that both women were of Asian descent and did not have a proficient level of Czech.

They said: “It is a procedure that is ugly, called a scraping. It is performed on women who bleed for a long time or have problems after childbirth and the like.

“For incomprehensible reasons, the two patients were swapped at the clinic and the poor woman’s child was scratched.”

The procedure led the pregnant woman to miscarry. The staff who carried out the procedure have been suspended and an investigation is underway, according to reports.