Portland Medical Malpractice Law Blog

All the technology and medical advancements made in the past few decades have done little to solve the problem of medical errors. According to the Joint Commission, wrong-site surgeries occur up to 40 times each week in the U.S. A recent report from the federal government found medical mistakes contribute to the deaths of an estimated 15,000 Medicare patients each month. Statistics like these indicate hospital negligence is one of the top three causes of death in the United States, following heart disease and cancer.

Despite being aware of this significant problem, hospitals have either been unable or unwilling to take steps to improve patient safety. There are a variety of reasons for this including: hospitals' hierarchical nature, lack of transparency, resistance to change and reluctance to make patient safety a top priority.

Kaiser Health News reported that hospitals could dramatically improve patient safety by taking a few basic steps. These include: consistent use of checklists to ensure all medical providers follow proper procedures, encouraging more collaboration and teamwork between doctors and nurses, and stressing the importance of hand washing to all employees.

There was a big push to make medical records electronic, implement e-prescribing systems and use technology so physicians had instant access to patient data. Everyone thought all this technology was a good thing for patient safety, and it has provided many benefits.

Unfortunately, the easy availability of electronic devices has also caused what is being termed "distracted doctoring," which puts patients at risks for surgical injuries and other forms of medical malpractice.

The New York Times recently reported on this issue, and found that "distracted doctoring" is a trend that seems to be on the rise at hospitals. For instance, in a survey over half of those technicians who monitor bypass machines admitted they spoke on their cellphones while heart surgeries were taking place.

One patient was left partially paralyzed after a neurosurgeon made at least 10 personal calls on a wireless headset during an operation. There are other reports of healthcare providers using computers in intensive care units to check personal emails and shop online.

A new report from the Institute of Medicine warns that electronic health records may pose a threat to patient safety. The Institute says the electronic record-keeping systems are poorly designed and confusing to use.

Electronic medical records do have many benefits. For example, they can prevent sometimes-deadly medication errors by alerting a doctor who is about to prescribe a drug that a patient is allergic to.

However, many of the record-keeping systems suffer from usability problems. The report warns that "designed and applied inappropriately, health (technology) can add an additional layer of complexity to the already complex delivery of health care, which can lead to adverse consequences." For example, the report noted that system crashes and software quirks can contribute to medication dosage errors and can cause doctors to miss the warning signs of a potentially fatal illness.

To make matters worse, competing software products are often unable to communicate with each other. Further, many suppliers' contracts prohibit doctors and hospitals from openly airing concerns about errors or defects in the software.

Creating a culture of patient safety has been an ongoing focus of the federal government, the medical community and patient advocacy organizations. While some medical providers have implemented high-tech safety processes such as diagnostic computer programs and interactive records systems. Other medical professionals have successfully reduced medication errors and improved patient safety in an extremely low-tech way: no interruption zones (NIZs.)

In 2008, medical errors cost the American public $17.1 billion dollars. Nearly 100,000 people die each year due to the common medical error of hospital-acquired infections. One in every seven Medicare recipients is a victim of medical errors, and medical errors occur in about one-third of all hospital admissions across the nation. Reduction of medical errors could save billions of dollars and countless lives.

In 2010, experts reported the 10 basic elements that contribute to medical errors. Among these elements, environmental factors were prominent. Caregiver distractions during drug administration or care administration increase the risk for adverse medical incidents. To solve this problem, professionals devised NIZs, also called quiet or med-zones, in which nurses could prepare orders without distractions.