8000 deaths in Australia each year as a result of medical errors, more than the annual road toll of about 1600

In NSW up to 130,000 patients are being harmed or experience near misses each year. There are an estimated 8000 deaths in Australia each year as a result of medical errors, more than the annual road toll of about 1600.
 

SMH 20.04.07- Condition critical: the poor state of the NSW health system - National

"Safety breaches in Australian healthcare are killing more people than breast cancer or road accidents,"

Associate Professor Bolsin (Source: SMH 11.07.07)

One in Ten Australians are harmed by hospital treatment

The Australian 28.10.08.

Catastrophic medical errors are going unreported

Catastrophic medical errors are going unreported at the Royal Children's Hospital, according to research by doctors, who have called for more measures to prevent them.

In 176 days of research, Reshma Silas and James Tibballs found 405 adverse events in 165 patients at Royal Children's Hospital, with 28 per cent classified as major - an error requiring a significant medical intervention - or catastrophic, defined as an error leading to permanent disability or death. Catastrophic outcomes were found in 12 cases - 3 per cent of the 405 events. It is not known if any children died, although the researchers said one case was the subject of legal action.

In contrast, when the researchers looked at adverse events reported through the hospital's voluntary reporting scheme over the same period, they found 166 events in 100 patients, with the vast majority of reports rated insignificant or minor. Seven per cent were considered moderate, meaning the event led to increased hospitalisation, and 2 per cent were major events, leading to significant medical intervention. No catastrophic events were reported.

There was significant crossover between the patient groups, with three-quarters of these 100 patients involved in the systematic review, leading the researchers to conclude that systematic reporting, through interviews with staff and tracking patient outcomes, was far better at picking up adverse events than voluntary reporting.

Professor Tibballs said a compulsory system of reporting serious adverse events, known as ''sentinel events'', to health departments captured the tip of the iceberg because it only asked for gross and obvious examples of incompetence such as surgery on the wrong body part.

Source: The Age, 07.03.11.

Thousands of people are likely to be dying every year as a result of preventable hospital errors

Doctors and academics yesterday called for more funding of hospital programs to examine adverse events (unintended injuries from medical care) after The Age revealed inadequacies in the voluntary reporting system for such incidents at the Royal Children's Hospital.

Professor of health economics at Monash University, Jeff Richardson, said that if the last major Australian study to estimate the number of deaths due to preventable adverse events was right, 350 patients were dying every two weeks because of the problem.

Professor Richardson said it was astonishing that so little had been done since The Quality in Australian Health Care Study in 1995 estimated about 12,000 Australians were dying each year because of preventable events.

''The issue of adverse events in the Australian health system should dominate all others. However, it would be closer to the truth to describe it as Australia's best kept secret,'' he said.

Source: The Age, 08.03.11.

most surgeons do not have a clear understanding of their short-term outcomes for the majority of procedures

The public would probably be surprised to know that most surgeons do not have a clear understanding of their short-term outcomes for the majority of procedures they perform.

Of even greater concern is the lack of data on long-term outcomes associated with surgical interventions.

Many surgeons argue that they are too busy and do not have the time and resources to conduct this sort of follow-up. This is not entirely without foundation, but it does seem difficult to defend a stance that says “I will continue to work feverishly at the operations I do but not assess how successful my results are”.

Guy Maddern: No excuse for poor surgical outcomes

MJA INSIGHT, 8 August 2011