A South Eastern Health Board investigation into how the wrong body was released from a mortuary to an undertaker has exonerated the board's employees.
An employee of an undertaker collected the body from the morgue at the local general hospital and brought it to the wake, where the error was discovered. It was returned immediately to the hospital.
The incident happened on August 29th.
The board chief executive, Mr John Cooney, said there were two bodies in the morgue at the time. However, the investigation found that the hospital procedure was satisfactory and the staff had done their job correctly.
The undertaker declined to comment on the matter last night.
Mr Cooney has apologised to the families of the deceased for the error, which he said should not have happened.
He said: "Nothing like this has ever happened in that hospital before and I am satisfied that our procedures worked on this occasion. However, we will examine the whole procedure again to make sure there is nothing we can improve on."