Many Doctors Fail to Report Medical Mistakes
According to a study conducted by Dr. Lauris Kaldjian, associate professor of medicine at the University of Iowa, Carver College of Medicine, doctors fail to report medical mistakes. The 338 doctors surveyed admitted that they are willing to report medical errors, but don’t. In the 1999 U.S. Institute of Medicine report, an estimated 100,000 Americans die because of medical mistakes. It was found that about 55 percent of those surveyed knew how to report errors and only 40 percent knew what kind of errors should be reported. The findings confirm previous research, said Dr. Thomas Gallagher, an associate professor of medicine at the University of Washington who has conducted numerous studies on error handling by the medical profession. “The gap comes from a number of areas. Physicians are unfamiliar with the reporting process and their role in it. And a fair number of physicians are not certain how the process works. More important, physicians often are skeptical about whether reporting will have an impact on the quality of medical care that they would like it to.” More feedback from hospitals when an error is reported could improve the situation, Kaldjian said. “It is all the more important that hospitals be clear about why they have this reporting system and how the information from it will be used,” he said.
Continue reading "Many Doctors Fail to Report Medical Mistakes " »
