Despite years of patient-safety efforts, an increasing number of health care facilities have reported mistakenly removing the wrong limbs or organs, slicing into the wrong side of bodies and performing surgery on the wrong patients. The Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health Care Organizations, which inspects more than 15,000 hospitals and surgical centers nationwide finds the situation getting worse.
Last year, health care facilities reported 84 operations to the commission that involved the wrong body part or the wrong patient. While some states require hospitals to report such blunders, many hospitals across the nation are not obligated to account for them publicly. Unfortunately, many hospitals choose not to report such errors.
A new study documents cases in which surgeons operated on the wrong arm, the wrong rib and the wrong person, among other mistakes. The study analyzed 2.8 million operations over a 20-year period and was published in the Archives of Surgery. The findings suggest an excessive number of needless errors and injuries.
Funded by the federal Agency for Health Care Research and Quality, the study concludes that the error rate is “unacceptable.” Obviously, more vigilance is needed. These horrible errors can be easily prevented and should never occur. When they do happen, these errors involving the wrong site, the wrong organ or worse, the wrong patient are usually a catastrophe.
Since 2004, doctors have been required by the joint commission to mark the spot they plan to cut while consulting with their patient before surgery. The commission also encourages patients to insist on such a mark.
Nurses are supposed to call a “time out” in the operating room, according to commission protocol, calling everyone’s attention to a final safety check in an effort to ensure that the right procedure is performed on the right patient. But some surgeons, particularly those who believe they would never make such a stupid mistake, often ignore the safety protocols.
Having handled medical malpractice cases for over 20 years, we have sadly recognized the lack of any financial incentive for practicing safer medicine. Hospitals want operating-room staff to move patients through quickly. As long as speed is a measure of operating-room performance, needless, tragic errors will continue.
We have represented too many individuals needlessly harmed by preventable medical errors. One story that brings this realty home is that of a 43-year-old repairman who confidently went in for surgery. But instead of removing a tumor from his right ear, the team operated on his left ear — which had no tumor. The defendant hospital made light of the error noting that the error was just one of several thousand surgical procedures performed that year at the hospital. “No big deal.”
At Ward & Caggiano, we think it is a Big deal if any patient suffers from completely preventable mistakes such as these. We want you to protect yourself and your family. Do not assume your safe. We offer recommendations from the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health Care Organizations:
Bring a family member or friend to act as your advocate.
Remind the surgical team, nurses, surgeons and anesthesiologists what operations you are expecting.
Get the doctor to mark the correct surgical site.
Ask the doctor to take a “time out” to confer with the surgical team before the operation begins. This pause inside the operating room allows the team to confirm that the procedure, the patient and the surgical site are all correct.
If you or a loved one has been injured, contact us online or call us at 407-244-1212 or Toll Free at 800-381-8299 to set up a FREE consultation to discuss your legal options.
