Medical Malpractice has a higher risk of occurring when a patient transfers between various treatment sites and caregivers even within the same institution. A well coordinated transition between various healthcare settings can reduce the risk of medical errors, decrease hospital re-admission rates, avoid the duplication of services and reduce the…
Failure to diagnose cancer in teenagers may be medical malpractice. Because cancer in young adults and teenagers count for only 1% of all diagnosed cancers, they have a higher risk of being misdiagnosed. A recent report “Improving Diagnosis: Teenage Cancer Trust Report on Improving the Diagnostic Experience of Young People…
To reduce medical malpractice, the Institute of Medicine called for the measurement and reporting of physicians quality in its reports To Err is Human: Building a Safer Health System (1999) and Crossing the Quality Chasm: A New Health System for the 21st Century (2001). More than 10 years later, it…
Failure to diagnose May-Thurner Syndrome may be medical malpractice that can lead to post-thrombotic syndrome, potentially fatal pulmonary embolism, pulmonary hypertension, and in the worst case paradoxical embolism. In a recent article published in the current issue of the Journal of the American Academy of Physician Assistants, the author Jaclyn…
In a very sad medical malpractice case a 16 year old girl died of brain cancer after none of the 13 doctors who failed to diagnose the brain tumor ordered an MRI. Natasha Simmons had all the symptoms of a brain tumor: headaches, numbness, back pain, vomiting and problems with…
Until recently when a patient with prostate cancer was developing resistance to drugs that block testosterone, the hormone that fuels the cancer growth, his urologist would refer him to an oncologist who would start chemotherapy. The situation recently changed with the arrival on the market of new drugs such as…
Doctors often fail to diagnose cancer in women with dense breast tissue because mammograms screenings are not reliable for women with this condition. Recent statistics and studies also show that women with dense breast tissue have a higher risk of developing breast cancer. Therefore advocacy groups have been pushing for…
Every drug with two names, brand name and generic name, is a medication error waiting to happen, writes Theresa Brown in her latest Opinion in The New York Times blog. A system that would keep only the brand name with a “-G” appended at the end of the name for…
The risk of physician-related ED medication errors among seriously ill and injured children in rural EDs can be significantly reduced with telemedicine consultations according to a study published in the current issue of Pediatrics, the Official Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. The study looked at 234 seriously ill…
A doctor can commit medical malpractice if he is not properly trained to use the Electronic Medical Record (EMR) system. In a recent case study Web Morbidity and Mortality looks at the case of an epileptic patient who experienced temporary toxicity because of a medication error linked to improper use…