Disclosure Of Medical Errors Research Articles

The problem of medical misadventures: a review of E. Haavi Morreim's Holding Health Care Accountable.

Health-care provider liability has again taken center stage in American political debate, but with an ironic twist. In the seventies, physicians wanted tort reform, but they measured such reform solely by a reduction in both the risk of being sued and the size of any judgment a plaintiff could win. Malpractice reforms in many states in the seventies therefore capped damages, reduced contingency awards to lawyers, and restricted other tort rules to limit plaintiff success. Today physicians are conflicted. They want an increase in liability exposure — not for themselves, but for managed care plans. We have therefore ended up with a series of overlapping debates, with the same debaters taking contradictory positions. Should managed care organizations—until now protected by ERISA preemption from liability—be liable? Physicians say yes. But should physicians be protected from the threat of suit, which they argue acts as anin terroremdevice that drives disclosure of medical errors into hiding?

Risks of reporting sentinel events.

Commentary Health AffairsVol. 19, No. 5 Risks of Reporting Sentinel EventsBryan A. Liang AffiliationsBryan Liang is Dr. Arthur W. Grayson Distinguished Professor of Law and Medicine, at the Southern Illinois University Schools of Law and Medicine, in Carbondale. He is currently on leave as a faculty fellow at the Institute for Social Law, Katholieke Universiteit, Leuven, in Belgium.PUBLISHED:September/October 2000No Accesshttps://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.19.5.112AboutSectionsView articleView Full TextView PDFPermissions ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmail ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack CitationsPermissions View articleTOPICSLegal and regulatory issuesRoot cause analysisHealth care providersPatient safetyQuality of careLiabilityLegislationMedical malpracticeClinical careHospital administration Loading Comments... Please enable JavaScript to view the comments powered by Disqus. DetailsExhibitsReferencesRelated Article MetricsCitations: Crossref 26 History Published online 1 September 2000 InformationCopyright © by Project HOPE: The People-to-People Health Foundation, Inc.ACKNOWLEDGMENTSThis paper was presented in part at the thirty-ninth Annual Meeting of the American College of Legal Medicine, New Orleans, 11–13 March 1999. The author gratefully acknowledges the support of the GarwinFamilyFoundation, the editing assistance of Shannon M. Biggs, and the comments of Don Metz and two anonymous reviewers.PDF downloadCited ByEffectiveness of systems changes suggested by simulation of adverse surgical outcomes23 December 2015 | BMJ Simulation and Technology Enhanced Learning, Vol. 1, No. 3Using simulation to improve root cause analysis of adverse surgical outcomes11 February 2014 | International Journal for Quality in Health Care, Vol. 26, No. 2To report or not to report? Why some nurses are reluctant to whistleblowClinical Governance: An International Journal, Vol. 17, No. 4Can simulation improve the traditional method of root cause analysis: A preliminary investigationSurgery, Vol. 152, No. 3Inpatient suicide: preventing a common sentinel eventGeneral Hospital Psychiatry, Vol. 31, No. 2A Legal Perspective on Errors in Medicine28 February 2013Legal Concerns in Patient SafetyJournal of Patient Safety, Vol. 4, No. 2The Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act of 2005Journal of Patient Safety, Vol. 4, No. 1Special doctor's docket: discovery of patient safety materials in the Veterans Affairs systemJournal of Clinical Anesthesia, Vol. 20, No. 1Clinicians' and managers' responses to patients' complaintsClinical Governance: An International Journal, Vol. 12, No. 4Patient Safety Data Sharing and Protection From Legal Discovery5 February 2021 | Journal of Medical Regulation, Vol. 93, No. 2The Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act of 2005: Provisions and Potential Opportunities3 September 2016 | American Journal of Medical Quality, Vol. 22, No. 1"Health Courts" and Accountability for Patient SafetyThe Milbank Quarterly, Vol. 84, No. 3Fade to Black: Importation and Counterfeit Drugs6 January 2021 | American Journal of Law & Medicine, Vol. 32, No. 2-3Los sistemas de registro y notificación de efectos adversos y de incidentes: una estrategia para aprender de los erroresRevista de Calidad Asistencial, Vol. 20, No. 4Learning from OthersJournal of Patient Safety, Vol. 1, No. 2Medical Liability Insurance and Damage Caps: Getting beyond Band Aids to Substantive Systems Treatment to Improve Quality and Safety in Healthcare6 January 2021 | American Journal of Law & Medicine, Vol. 30, No. 4To err on humans is not benignJournal of Health Economics, Vol. 23, No. 5Medical MalpracticeNew England Journal of Medicine, Vol. 350, No. 3U.S. Legal System for Medical Safety and Quality-Focusing on Reporting Systems, Administrative Sanctions, and Performance EvaluationSOCIOTECHNICA, Vol. 2Patients' and Physicians' Attitudes Regarding the Disclosure of Medical ErrorsSurvey of Anesthesiology, Vol. 47, No. 5Does Full Disclosure of Medical Errors Affect Malpractice Liability? The Jury Is Still OutThe Joint Commission Journal on Quality and Safety, Vol. 29, No. 10Layperson and physician perceptions of the malpractice system: implications for patient safetySocial Science & Medicine, Vol. 57, No. 1An overview of United States lawHematology/Oncology Clinics of North America, Vol. 16, No. 6Health Policy ReviewHealthcare Delivery as a Service System

Disclosure and prevention of medical errors. Committee on Bioethical Issues of the Medical Society of the State of New York.

Medical errors occur and are sometimes unavoidable. Physicians generally, but not always, have ethical and moral obligations to disclose their errors to the patient. Because common medical errors can be expected, physicians are obligated to work within health systems toward reducing systems flaws that promote errors. However, the obligations of physicians to disclose errors made by others are less clear. This article discusses the professional ethics involved in disclosing and preventing medical errors.

The frequency and severity of medical malpractice claims.

THE early seventies witnessed a rapid increase in the frequency and severity of medical malpractice claims.' In California, for example, both frequency and severity increased at an average rate of almost 20 percent per annum, cumulating to yield an increase in total claim costs per physician of roughly 40 percent per annum.2 As striking as the growth over time is the variation among states. For example, in 1976 there was an 18-fold range in malpractice claim frequency, per capita or per physician, and a 30-fold range in severity. At the time of the 1975 medical malpractice "crisis," the explosion of claims was attributed to many factors, including growth in the number and complexity of medical treatments; pro-plaintiff trends in common law in general, and in particular the demise of traditional malpractice defenses such as charitable immunity and the locality rule; an increase in the number of lawyers and passage of no-fault automobile legislation in some states; and such intangible factors as the erosion of physician-patient relationships. In response to the crisis, tort "reforms" were enacted in most states during 1975 and 1976. These measures vary in detail from state to state, but their common purpose is to control claim costs by limiting the size of