Epilepsy Talk
Medical mistakes out of control! | January 24, 2012
Here’s a sobering statistic for you…
Believe it or not, the total number of medical errors and deaths in the U.S. equals SIX jumbo jets crashing every day! If a Jumbo Jet crashed and killed 280 people everyday…365 days a year…year after year…would you be concerned about flying? Would you question the Federal Aviation Administration? Would you demand answers? Think about it…close to 100,000 people dying every year from plane crashes. Sounds Ridiculous??!!
The numbers can be overwhelming and astonishing: The error rate of ICU’s (Intensive Care Units) would be like the post office losing over 16,000 pieces of mail every hour of every day. Or like our banks wrongly cashing 32,000 checks every hour of every day, every year!
In one decade, the deaths caused by conventional medicine are approximately 8 million. This is more than all the casualties from all the wars America has ever fought in. And that’s just one decade.
In short, the American medical system is the number one killer in the U.S.
One in five Americans (22%) report that they or a family member have experienced a medical error of some kind. Nationally, this translates into an estimated 22.8 million people with at least one family member who experienced a mistake in a doctor’s office or hospital.
According to a new Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) report released in June, 2011, the number of paid malpractice claims reported for events in the outpatient setting was similar to the number in the inpatient setting.
Meanwhile, there are now almost “30 times more outpatient visits than hospital discharges annually,” according to the JAMA study, “and invasive and high-technology diagnostic and therapeutic procedures are increasingly being performed in the outpatient setting.”
However, outpatient settings are rarely regulated like hospitals. So, those hospital procedures that have been deemed effective in reducing errors need to be modified for outpatient settings.
In hospitals, surgical errors are the number one reason patients or their families file malpractice suits (34%), with diagnostic errors (21%) and treatment errors (20%) rounding out the top three.
In the outpatient setting, diagnostic errors were implicated in a whopping 46% of the malpractice settlements while treatment decisions comprised 30% of the errors. At 14%, surgical errors were cited far less frequently as the basis for successful lawsuits.
In both settings though, more than two-thirds of the time these errors led to serious outcomes — for outpatients some 70% of the malpractice claims involved death or a major injury like permanent brain damage.
In other words, outpatient care may be just as hazardous to your health.
The Institute of Medicine (IOM) reports that a total of 1.5 million preventable injuries occur each year as a result of lapses in medication safety. Almost half of these befall residents of nursing homes or other long-term care facilities…about 400,000 afflict hospital patients…and the rest occur in outpatient settings.
Injuries to hospital patients alone are said by IOM to generate $3.5 billion in extra medical costs. Given that many drug-related injuries go undetected and/or unreported, the report concedes that the estimate of 1.5 million injuries is likely too low.
But as the study titled “To err is human…” asserts: the problem is not bad people in health care — it is that good people are working in bad systems that need to be made safer. Let’s not forget that doctors are people, too. Over worked, overwhelmed, sleep deprived, understaffed and suffer the daily burden of “death” by insurance claims.
My best internist retired a few years ago, long before it was necessary. When I asked him why, he said: “I went to medical school to help heal people and make them better. I did not go to become an insurance clerk. When you don’t have enough time to treat your patients, it’s time to quit.”
I saw him at a restaurant about a year later. He looked wonderful. Like a different man.
Resources:
http://www.answer-my-health-question.info/medical-error-statistics.html
http://jama.ama-assn.org/content/305/23/2427.short
www.yournutrition.com/pdf/health_care/05.pdf
http://www.yourmedicaldetective.com/drgrisanti/dangerous_medicine.htm
http://www.newser.com/tag/1119/1/medical-malpractice.html
http://primeinc.org/casestudies/pharmacist/study/812/Medication_Error:_Right_Drug,_Wrong_Route
http://www.wrongdiagnosis.com/mistakes/causes.htm
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Tags: #1 killer, deaths, diagnostic, inpatient, medical errors, outpatient, surgical, treatment
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Yep and my son is one of them, he was diagnosed with epilepsy at the age of 4 and given the max dose of 4 different meds in the course of a decade – nothing worked or just made matters worse. We have seen many different neurologists and nobody questioned the diagnosis. Well, luckily we parents did. Comes out he has panic disorder, those attacks are panic attacks. We are still in the process of weaning him off all his anti-seizure meds. So far the amount of attacks are less than half of what they were before…let’s see what happens, we take it from here. (with the great help of UNC Child Neurology and Child Neuropsychiatry AND what a difference it makes to take less medication, he is finally HERE).
Comment by Diana K — January 24, 2012 @ 9:15 PMJan -04:00Jan
Oh boy Diana…that’s some mistake!
You might be interested in Victory Junction • North Carolina.
http://www.holeinthewallcamps.org/page.aspx?pid=290
It’s part of the Hole in the Wall Camps and they “are designed to create positive recreational experiences where children with serious illnesses are understood and accepted. Our camps are fully inclusive with accessible tree houses, adaptive equestrian programs, high and low ropes courses and all the traditional “camp” activities like swimming, boating, arts and crafts and campfires. Children soar at camp because we give them the chance to do things they never imagined possible due to the complexity of their medical needs. At camp children build independence, gain self-confidence and enhance coping and resilience.” And 14 seems an ideal age.
Having worked in the local epilepsy camp, I know how wonderful it can be just to meet and mingle with other kids who have disabilities. Especially those who wouldn’t ordinarily be able to go to camp.
And for what it’s worth, here’s a link to support groups for Panic Disorders, Anxiety and Phobias in N.C. based by Location (county).
http://www.supportworks.org/
http://www.supportworks.org/listnc.htm
Comment by Phylis Feiner Johnson — January 25, 2012 @ 9:15 AMJan -04:00Jan
One of the many thing’s I learned from the Epilepsy conference at NYU last year was from Orrin Devinsky. He said that [ Doctors need to make their own diagnosis and not rely solely on the chart or file they may get from another Dr].
I personally never thought about that until then and realized each time I went to a new Dr. I had my medical files transfered. I broke that cycle by moving 1500 miles away and leaving my files there. It paid off. PTL
Comment by Charlie — January 29, 2012 @ 9:15 PMJan -04:00Jan
How did it pay off? Because hospital #1 screwed up so badly?
Comment by Phylis Feiner Johnson — January 29, 2012 @ 9:15 PMJan -04:00Jan
It paid off because the doctor’s at NYU looked at me as a new patient and started from the ground floor. I was having more seizures than ever, and without my old files from the other hospital, they didn’t get a ‘jaded’ view of my epilepsy. The ultimate pay off has been being seizure free after 50 years of seizures
Comment by Charlie — January 30, 2012 @ 9:15 AMJan -04:00Jan
Boy, are you smart!
Comment by Phylis Feiner Johnson — January 30, 2012 @ 9:15 PMJan -04:00Jan
Well, Drs/hospitals Ain’t Killed me, Yet. But, not for the Lack of trying. Wrong/Rite Diagnosis, Wrong/Rite Med, Wrong DR/Rite Dr? Don’t seem to Matter! 30 Yrs & still kicking!
Hospitalized 3 Times in the past 15 Yrs. But, not for Treatment. Just to keep an Eye on me. Thank Goodness! Like Charlie, I ‘Lost’ my medical records. So yes, New Drs have to do their own tests! 
Comment by candi — February 15, 2012 @ 9:15 PMFeb -04:00Feb
And perhaps a fresh set of docs and new diagnostic tests will help set things straight.
Comment by Phylis Feiner Johnson — February 15, 2012 @ 9:15 PMFeb -04:00Feb