Medical Errors Case Study

Prevalence of Medical Errors Medical errors are currently the 3rd leading cause of death in the United States. These errors happen around us everyday even when we may not notice, which has made medical errors the silent killer in medicine. In todays society we must use manpower and our resources to deliver safer care as well as lead with accountability and help our providers to become more engaged. Every healthcare professional should listen to their patients and document care like we would want our own loved one’s care documented. Moreover, we must confront our colleagues if there are any questions about a patient’s safety, and most of all consider it a gift if a patient or a colleague approaches you with a safety concern. I believe the ultimate
In this case study the patient was not receiving standardized care, communication and teamwork was lousy and lastly no one was measuring results. As a health care professional we must practice acceptable quality of care and initiate safety to each one of our patients. The three main goals to prevent medical errors is to take evidence based practice and distilling the best knowledge into easy to follow checklists. By doing this we standardize routine procedures and ensure that each and every patient gets the best up to date care. Secondly, placing doctors, nurses and staff on an even playing field can encourage communication and teamwork. This will make sure everyone follows the checklist, as well as preventing miscommunication issues like the one in Michaels story. Lastly, by measuring results we can be sure the work is effective. There were no results documented in this case to show signs of the patient declining. Instead the staff assumed the child was okay instead of having actual results present. Change must happen in order to ensure that we are making hospitals safer for patients. This case was compelling to me because it shows how important communication and assessments are in the health care field (Muething et al.,
In quality improvement we talk about making changes that will increase quality. This helps us to continuously try to find ways to better ourselves and to improve our performance. I do believe that there is lack of quality improvement in some hospitals and it needs to be further implemented. Many nurses like to maintain the same baseline and continue to do the same routine that they are used to, instead of trying to improve their everyday norm. This process of improvement can help to prevent or resolve any quality care problems and improve the outcomes of patients (Muething et al., 2012). In conclusion, medical errors are ahead of stroke, diabetes, influenza and pneumonia. We are all human and mistakes happen; but there is no excuse for amputating a wrong limb or taking out the left kidney instead of the right one. In addition, there is no excuse for over 60% of healthcare workers not properly washing their hands or making careless mistakes such as giving a patient 10x the dose of medication that was prescribed. It is time to stop making excuses for our irresponsible inaccuracies and to stop this tendency to become quiet when an error has error. It is ultimately the hospitals and medical centers responsibility to shine on light on all of these problems so we can further improve our health care system and move past this medical wall of silence