Malpractice Paper

Whether or not a specific sentinel medical event falls under the opuses of malpractice depends heavily on the totality of the circumstances surrounding the event. While many individuals may file malpractice litigation based solely on the presence of a negative outcome stemming from a treatment, test or intervention, oftentimes cases originating from this reason only will not meet the requirements needed to support a claim of malpractice. In contrast what is often required in determining whether or not associated events will fall under the umbrella of malpractice is evidence to support that actions on the part of a practitioner deviated from the recognized “standard of care” in treating the patient and that this deviation resulted in harm
to the patient (Cheeks, 2013). Based on these findings, human resource managers should invest the time in research of what factors involving care are standard and what factors deviate from the acceptable guidelines. As is the case with many healthcare organizations, procedures will oftentimes dictate practices. Specific algorithms, flow charts and protocols should be in place to remove any confusion surrounding what practices are below the standard of care.
While many current health information technologies aid in reducing the human factors associated with many medical errors through the use of a redundant computer aided checks, there still exists a point in which providers at all levels must diligently adhere to organizational policies and procedures. In the presented case, evidence is presented which supports that an undesired outcome followed a surgical procedure. It is also presented that significant signs and symptoms along with a relevant patient complaint were made known to the night shift nurse. In determining whether or not her subsequent actions would rise to the level needed to prove malpractice, more information would be needed regarding the departments policies for reporting findings of this nature. In this case, the night shift nurse forwarded her findings on during her change-of-shift report to the day time charge nurse whose subsequent actions are not clearly stated. Nonetheless, the patient’s condition was able to rise to a level of one which resulted in long lasting negative effects following a follow-up surgical procedure which was performed by the physician. The fact that
upon noticing the deficits the physicians’ actions were to immediately take the patient to surgery indicates a high level of severity in the patients’ condition and suggests that the harm to the patient resulted from actions on the part of one or both nurses depending on what the departments established policy is pertaining to the notification of patient deterioration to physicians. Another variant which exists might relate to whether or not the physician provided a clear written order indicating specific actions to be taken in the event of a significant assessment findings and whether or not this order was correctly carried out by the nursing staff. Based on the presented limited information however, it is suggestive that the greatest negative effects stemmed from the actions taken on the part of the charge nurse. This is largely in part to the expectation that as a supervisor she would be aware of the proper actions to be taken to best benefit the patient. While the presented case does lack all the needed elements to clearly identify which providers’ actions were reasonable and which were not due to a lack of departmental policy and/or physicians’ orders, one crucial key point is brought to light, that point being the importance of processes and clearly communicating among all staff the expectations of their positions.
In doing so, human resource managers are able to constantly evaluate employee performance and provide feedback that is continuous. This overall process allows for department managers to provider employee guidance by way of counseling before employee actions rise to the level of necessitating a verbal, written or any other punitive action on the part of supervision or administrations (Fallon & McConnell, 2007). One additional manner in which supervisors might elicit the involvement of employees to see what changes might bring about better overall processes for a department or organization might be eliciting input from employees regarding what specific elements of their positions they feel may need to modification. This process of actively seeking out from employees their opinions not only stands to increase the employees sense of ownership in their organizations, but also increases an employee feeling as if their opinions are valued by mangers and that their direct actions greatly contribute to the ultimate success or failure of the organization as a whole. By requesting from employees’ information regarding
how the company is viewed by outsiders, what changes might make the organization more successful or what characteristics describe the organization when it is performing at its best, managers lay a foundation which allows them to get ahead of mutually agreed upon negative behaviors and be proactive by their choice to act instead of react to negative aspects of an employee (Steinbrecher, 2014).