Medical errors may now be the third-leading cause of death in the United States – claiming 251,000 lives every year, more than respiratory disease, accidents, stroke and Alzheimer’s, according to a study published Tuesday.
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Medical error could even merit a higher place on the list, since their estimate “is an underestimate”, the letter said, based on studies that didn’t look at outpatient deaths or deaths at home.
Johns Hopkins University researchers analyzed eight years of US data and concluded that more than 250,000 people died each year due to medical errors.
A new study finds that medical mistakes are the third leading cause of death in the U.S. They then calculated hospital admission rates from 2013 and determined that based on a total of 35,416,020 hospitalizations, 251,454 deaths stemmed from medical errors, which the researchers say translates to 9.5 percent of all deaths each year in the U.S. The latest study takes into consideration certain facts from a prior one which estimates about 250,000 Americans dying each year as a result of medical diagnostic errors.
Dr. Martin Makary, lead author of the study and professor of Surgery and Health Policy and Management at Johns Hopkins University, said he hoped the study would reveal how much needs to be done to address patient safety.
“This problem should not be framed as we have bad doctors, it’s a system problem…a failure to impact normal human error”, said Makary. With over 100 countries coding their mortality data via the ICD codes, exact statistics on deaths associated with medical error is lacking. The CDC doesn’t track these, and the New York Times notes it is not a cause of death that would appear on a death certificate.
It does however offer an uncomfortable situation for the doctor who may end up reporting the cause of death as a result of a medical error. At present, the cause of death listed on a death certificate reflects an insurance billing code. Furthermore, hospitals should undertake a rapid independent investigation into deaths to determine if human error was a possible contributor.
Makary and Dr. Michael Daniel think that their analysis will help in bringing reforms in health care system.
Anderson, however, said it’s an “uncomfortable situation” for a doctor to report that a patient died from a medical error.
The first step to reducing the problem, he suggests, is to deal with it more openly when things go wrong: “Make errors more visible when they occur, so their effects can be intercepted”.
The issue of patient safety has been a hot topic ever since the Institute of Medicine issued a landmark report on preventable medical errors 17 years ago, shocking the medical establishment and leading to significant debate about potential remedies.
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And they call for “more appropriate recognition of the role of medical error in patient death to heighten awareness and guide both collaborations and capital investments in research and prevention”.
