The HHS Office of Inspector General released a report on November 17, 2010 entitled, ADVERSE EVENTS IN HOSPITALS:
NATIONAL INCIDENCE AMONG MEDICARE BENEFICIARIES.
The USA Today 11/16/10 posting opened with the headline: Hospital Care Fatal for Some Medicare Patients. The study found that from the Medicare population only, there are 134,000 adverse events in hospitals, every month. From those adverse events, mostly from human errors, 15,000 Medicare patients die in hospitals, every month.
USA Today interviewed Arthur Levin, who was a member of the Institute of Medicine committee that published the landmark study, To Err is Human, Building a Safer Health Care System in 1999, that found as many as 100,000 people every year die due to errors in hospitals. This new study indicates that that at 15,000 deaths a month the new number is likely to be 180,000 deaths a year, among Medicare patients only.
Levin stated that “The findings “tell us exactly what some of us have been afraid of, that we have not made much progress.” “What more do we have to do to make sure that sick people can rest assured that they’re not going to be harmed by the care they’re getting?”
Click on the links to read more.
What are your thoughts on the subject?
