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In 1999, a report was released called “To Err is Human,” described as one of the most influential reports in medical history. The report authors declared a drastic reduction in medical mistakes by fifty percent over five years was necessary saying, “it would be irresponsible to expect anything less. Every year, because of medical mistakes like accidental overdoses, infections and other caregiver errors, up to 98,000 U.S. patient deaths are suffered, according to the report.
There are still more deaths from medical mistakes than from motor vehicle accidents, breast cancer or AIDS, and despite the shockwaves the report created, the 35 million patients hospitalized in the nation''s 6,000 hospitals were not significantly safer than they were five years prior. Though thousands of hospitals have launched safety campaigns, experts vary widely in opinion when deciding if they are having any effect on the number of medical mistakes occurring. Some medical mistakes have resulted in medical or nursing malpractice cases, and doctors claim large jury awards on frivolous lawsuits have resulted in significant increases in insurance premiums, which have driven medical professionals out of a job.
Efforts to curb these “frivolous” lawsuits have been made by capping awards on noneconomic damages, but following the 1999 report that highlighted major flaws in the medical system, some consumer groups and patient safety specialists think capping awards by unjustly blaming high costs on medical and nursing malpractice cases dodges responsibility of reducing medical mistakes. Blaming the nursing malpractice cases as reason for reform instead of changing the major preventable medical errors to implement safety reform, many critics think lawyers are being used as scapegoat for negligent medical care.
Dr. Lucian Leape of the Harvard School of Public Health and co-author of “To Err is Human,” believes “the evidence of improvement is indeed unimpressive.” Although Leape and other specialists have been encouraged with doctor, nurse and hospital administrator talks of preventing medical mistakes, which used to never be admitted among health care professionals, many note the ability to better ensure patient safety would have been easier had Congress had not rejected the Institute of Medicine''s recommendation under pressure from the hospital industry for a mandatory national reporting system to track errors.
Traditionally, malpractice suits were filed against mainly doctors, but today, more and more malpractice suits involve nurses. Nursing departments are often considered the backbone of a hospital, but the widespread nursing shortage has given nurses a heavier workload. A Journal of the American Medical Association article found that nurses with a heavier workload taking care of patients in hospitals resulted in the patient having a 31 percent higher risk of dying.
Key components of nursing skills are the ability to foresee any future complications and things that could go wrong and keep it from happening. This can be carried through by understanding the patient and what the patients might be at risk for in order to adequately monitor them. Although the majority of healthcare professionals are in the profession because they have compassion and want to improve patient care, many mistakes occur ever year, leaving family members dead or with serious complications.
If you believe a death or injuries were the result of negligence and a nursing malpractice case might be present, an attorney specializing in medical/ nursing malpractice cases will be able to review the circumstances surrounding the treatment(s) in question in order to advise the client of his/her best legal rights and options.
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