An eye surgeon in China repeatedly punched an 82-year-old patient he was operating on, video shows

• A video appears to show an eye surgeon in China punching a patient several times during a procedure.
• The incident occurred in 2019 but has come to light after a prominent doctor posted the video online.

A doctor in China appeared to punch an 82-year-old patient multiple times in the head during a procedure in a recently surfaced video.

Authorities in China are investigating the incident, which occurred in 2019 but recently came to light after prominent Chinese doctor Ai Fen shared the video, the BBC reported.

In the video, the surgeon suddenly begins to hit the patient several times in the head with increasing force. The patient appears to jerk in response, and a medical assistant rushes forward.

The surgeon has been suspended, and the hospital's CEO has been dismissed by the hospital's parent company, Aier China, said the report.

The patient was bruised on the forehead after the incident at an ophthalmology hospital in the southwestern Chinese city of Guigang. The hospital management apologized and paid 500 yuan, or $70, the BBC said.

Aier China said in a statement that the patient had moved her head and eyes multiple times during the procedure and had not responded to the doctor's warnings in Mandarin as she could only speak a local dialect.

Because of this, the surgeon "treated the patient roughly in an emergency situation," Aier China said, per the BBC.

The patient's son told local media outlets that his mother is now blind in her left eye, but it was not clear whether this was related to the incident, per the BBC.

Ai, who shared the video with two million followers on her Weibo account, is known for her role as a whistleblower in alerting the public about the initial COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan.

She has been involved in a legal dispute with Aier China, which operates a chain of eye hospitals, over her claim that she nearly lost sight in one of her eyes due to the treatment she received there.