Articles Tagged with medical malpractice

To boost transplant patient survival rates, Dr Mark Zucker and his team have allegedly been keeping vegetative patients on life support for an entire year without family consent according to a recent investigation by ProPublica.  For hospitals that have organ transplant programs, the patient survival rate is the most important number tracked by the US Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services. If a hospital has a “one year survival rate” falling bellow an expected number calculated by an algorithm, an audit might be launched by the agency. If the audit uncovers serious problems, the transplant program can potentially loose its Medicare certification. As a result the hospital would loose the procedures paid by Medicare and by some medicaid and private insurance plans that only reimburse for transplants at Medicare approved transplant programs. A hospital charges around 1.4 million for a heart transplant.

Newark Beth Israel advertises itself as one of the best heart and lung transplant hospitals in the country. For 30 years, Dr Mark Zucker has been leading the heart and lung transplant program. His heart transplant surgeon, Dr. Margarita Camacho, has been performing most of the heart surgeries since 2005. She developed a strong and successful reputation as a heart transplant surgeon,  travelling in person to donors hospitals to inspect the facility and the donor’s heart before traveling back to Beth Israel with the organ.

Very unethical decisions made by the hospital to game the system

Since 2001 more than 150,000 patients in the US have been notified by their healthcare providers that they might have been potentially exposed to bloodborne pathogens  such as hepatitis B virus (HBV), hepatitis C virus (HCV), and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) after a health provider committed medical malpractice by failing to observe standard injection safety protocols.

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is worried that too many healthcare providers are failing to observe what is considered basic infection control when injecting patients. A recent “One and Only” campaign seeks to raise awareness among healthcare providers and patients about safe injection practices.

These practices might seem obvious but incidents happen quite commonly and the consequences can be deadly.

The Center for Justice and Democracy recently released the 2019 edition of their Medical Malpractice Briefing Book. This very popular publication was updated with the most recent studies, statistics and general healthcare information and comes with links to the original material.

In addition to the usual sections, this new edition contains several new sections, including: sexual assault by doctors; misdiagnoses (the most prevalent and costly type of medical error); childbirth errors; plastic surgery; resident “hand-offs;” physician stress and burnout; and the real cause of insurance spikes for doctors.

Among the many findings, here are some of the most interesting:

As medicine evolves so do the risks for medical malpractice. Here are the top main risks according to  the 2019 Top 10 Patient Safety Concerns recently published by the ECRI Institute:

1. Improper use of the Electronic Health Record (EHR) can be medical malpractice that can cause severe harm and sometimes death.  Diagnoses that are not proprely communicated or followed up are the number one concern when it comes to patient safety in 2019.  Too often, the 3 main components of the EHR, The diagnosis, the treatment plan and the follow up plan are inaccurate or missing. As a result, the risk of diagnostic error increases.
2. The second biggest cause of concern for patient safety is the over prescription of antibiotics to patients that increases their antibiotic resistance and as a result limits their future treatment options. The over prescription of antibiotics affect particularly seniors who believe antibiotics can help them to feel better in almost any type of situation and doctors who are handing them out like candies.

To prevent medical malpractice, hospitals and other medical facilities have to constantly be aware of the new technological hazards that can be detrimental to patients. Every year the ECRI Institute compiles a list of the most hazardous technological issues that can hurt patients. Here are a summary of the 2019 Top 10 Health Technology Hazards.

1. ECRI lists potential hackers attacks to medical networks the number one technological threat for the medical community. Hackers have been using remote access to infiltrate the network of healthcare organizations and to install ransomware or other malware to steal data, degrade or render inoperative devices or hijack computers for other malevolent purposes. Hackers look for organizations with weak cyber security therefore it is essential for healthcare organizations to make sure that they are up to date with all recommended cyber security practices.
2. Dirty mattresses that are oozing body fluids from previous patients to new patients has become the biggest health concern of hospitals. Healthcare facility are facing major issues with mattress covers that are not proprely cleaned or that become weak and susceptible to break after being cleaned with inappropriate products and/or procedures.  The ECRI Institute recommends that suppliers provide clear guidelines on how to clean covers without compromising their integrity.