Hospitalization usually gives people a chance to get better, but there are
also cases when expectations are not reached or, even worse, people might die
while in hospital following medical errors.
According
to the fifth annual Patient Safety in American Hospitals Study, from 2004
through 2006, patient safety errors resulted in 238,337 potentially preventable
deaths of U.S. Medicare Patients and cost the Medicare program $8.8 billion.
The
analysis included data of 41 million Medicare patient records and was released
April 8 by HealthGrades, a health care ratings organization.
The
analysis found that out of all patients, 3 percent experienced medical errors,
such as anesthesia complications, bed sores, failure to rescue (respiratory
failure, pulmonary embolism or deep vein thrombosis, sepsis and abdominal
wounds that split open after surgery), selected infections due to medical care,
as well as many post-operative events. This percentage comes out to about 1.1
million medical errors over the three-year period.
Other
findings of the study include: patients who experienced a medical error have a
20 percent chance of dying, the study said; top performing hospitals were 43
percent less likely to experience medical errors; failure to rescue accounted
for at least 188,000 lives lost, about 128 deaths for every 1,000 patients; bed
sores, failure to rescue and post-operative respiratory failure accounted for
63.4 percent of incidents.
"While
many U.S. hospitals have taken extensive action to prevent medical errors, the prevalence
of likely preventable patient safety incidents is taking a costly toll on our
health care systems -- in both lives and dollars," Dr. Samantha Collier,
HealthGrades' chief medical officer and primary author of the study, said in a
prepared statement, according to the Washington Post.
The federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid
Services has already announced that, starting with October 1, it will stop
reimbursing hospitals for the treatment of eight major preventable errors,
including objects forgotten in the body after surgery and certain kinds of
post-surgical infections.
“With the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
scheduled to stop reimbursing hospitals for treatment of eight major preventable
errors, including objects left in the body after surgery and certain
post-surgical infections, starting Oct. 1, the financial implications for
hospitals are substantial,” HealthGrades said.
