In 1999, the Institute of Medicine published a report that described how 98,000 Americans were dying every year in hospitals due to preventable medical errors. This report at HealthGrades follows up on that report and indicates that while another 500,000 Americans have needlessly died in the past 5 years, little has been done to stem this epidemic tide of preventable medical errors in hospitals.
If this were a disease, it would be on the front page of every newspaper, every day.
But because it is simply humans being human, making human mistakes, we seem to be more lax about it. We figure, hey, even doctors make mistakes. Nobody’s perfect. We can’t hold them to a higher standard than any other profession.
Yet in medicine, when things go wrong, people die (unlike, say, in plumbing where you just end up with a little water on your floor). I would think that we would do everything within our resources to help lower this number substantially, year after year. Removing stupid errors — like unreadable doctor handwriting from prescription pads and switching to electronic prescriptions only — would seem like a no-brainer (and in fact, many hospitals have made the switch).
The report is 23 pages long, but it’s worth it to at the very least skim it. Remember, you or someone you love will be in a hospital in your lifetime. It might make you feel better to know people were working hard on reducing preventable medical errors from taking your, or your loved one’s, life.
Dr. John Grohol is the CEO and founder of Psych Central. He is an author, researcher and expert in mental health online, and has been writing about online behavior, mental health and psychology issues -- as well as the intersection of technology and human behavior -- since 1992. Dr. Grohol sits on the editorial board of the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking and is a founding board member and treasurer of the Society for Participatory Medicine.Like this author?
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Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 28 Jul 2004
Published on PsychCentral.com. All rights reserved.
Grohol, J. (2004). 98,000 Patient Deaths per Year May Have Been Low. Psych Central. Retrieved on February 14, 2012, from http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2004/07/28/98000-patient-deaths-per-year-may-have-been-low/
