HEALTH CARE REFORM SHOULD ADDRESS MEDICAL MISTAKES

One topic that has yet to be addressed in the health care reform debate is medical mistakes.  Recent studies have revealed that approximately 200,000 people die every year in the United States due to medical mistakes and infections, and hundreds of thousands more suffer debilitating injuries.  Yet there has been very little debate about how to curb this carnage, and there has been little discussion concerning the annual health care costs associated with medical mistakes.

To demonstrate the tremendous costs of medical mistakes, consider the following which involve two Schorr Law Firm clients:

Case no. 1 - Seven year old child undergoes a “benign” day procedure at a prominent local hospital for children.  During the procedure, something goes completely wrong and the child’s heart stops on the operating table and the child is placed on life-support.  After eight days of life-support and multiple complications, the family decides to remove the child from life-support, and he dies.  The day procedure would have likely cost approximately $20,000.  However, because the child was placed on life-support for eight days, the family’s insurance company was billed more than $600,000.00.

Case no. 2 - Twenty-nine year old first grade teacher suffers a stroke while teaching.  She is rushed to a local prominent hospital ER where she unnecessarily waited for an hour and a half before finally being seen by an emergency room physician.  Her husband, who was with the young teacher in the ER and witnessed her rapid decline, pleaded for someone to help his ailing wife but was told that if he didn’t calm down he would be forced to leave.  When the doctor was finally summoned, it was quickly determined that the young teacher was suffering a massive stroke caused by a blood clot.  By the time the doctor arrived, it was too late to administer the clot busting drug tPA which must be administered within three hours of the onset of symptoms.  The teacher arrived in the ER only an hour and a half after the onset of symptoms, but after sitting in the ER for another 90 minutes, there was not enough time to prep her and administer the tPA drug within the three hour window.

Today, the teacher lives in a nursing home with a feeding tube.  She will never be able to be independent, is unable to communicate beyond simple hand gestures, wears diapers that must be changed throughout the day, cannot bathe herself, etc.  The nuerologist expert hired for her case states that had she been provided the tPA within the three hour window, she would have been up to 95% of what she was prior to the stroke.  He further states that she would have been able to work and would have been independent.  Instead, she will likely be a nursing home resident for the remainder of her life, and her life care plan (what it will likely cost to care for her for the rest of her life) was an astounding $13,000,000.00.  This is in addition to more than 1,000,000.00 that has already been incurred for medical care following the ER visit; an ER visit that should have cost approximately $10,000 to $20,000.

If medical mistakes contributed to the death of the child in case no. 1, then medical mistakes increased the cost of the “benign” day procedure from roughly $20,000.00 to more than $600,000.00 due to the eight days of life-support.  Considering that more than 200,000 people are reported to die nationally each year because of medical mistakes, these mistakes could cost tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars each year.

What about the people who are victims of medical mistakes who don’t die from medical mistakes, but who require lifelong care because of the consequences of medical mistakes?  If medical mistakes were committed and resulted in the permanent disability described in case no. 2 above, then medical mistakes are what necessitated $13,000,000.00 of future health care for the young teacher. If hundreds of thousands of United States citizens suffer debilitating injuries each year because of medical mistakes, how much do these mistakes cost?  How much does the United States spend annually to care for the victims of medical mistakes?  The number must be staggering and is likely in the hundreds of billions of dollars.

Health care reform is dominating the news lately.  Politicians and special interest groups are arguing their positions, and the public seems to be very split.  Meaningful health care reform should be widely accepted by the voters, and the politicians should listen to their constituents.  Because the current legislation is so controversial, perhaps the brakes need to be tapped and the entire health care matter revisited with new, meaningful legislation proposed.

It is my strong belief that one area worthy of consideration in the context of  health care reform is medical mistakes.  If fewer mistakes are made, fewer dollars will be used to care for the victims of mistakes.  Very few health care providers get sanctioned by their licensing boards for committing medical mistakes, and even fewer lose their licenses.  In order to prevent medical mistakes, one option may be to limit the ability of those who commit mistakes from continuing the practice of medicine.  Those health care providers who lack the competence and/or ability to practice medicine without committing mistakes should be limited in the procedures they provide, or, in some instances, removed from the profession altogether.  Without making medical mistakes part of health care reform, the United States will continue to lose billions and billions of dollars every year.

To learn more about reported medical mistakes, copy and paste following link in your browser to an article from the San Francisco Chronicle:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/08/12/ED1D1974ID.DTL&type=health

or do the same for the following article in the Houston Chronicle:

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/deadbymistake/6555095.html

If you or a loved one have been the victim of medical malpractice, Contact Schorr Law Firm for a free consultation by calling toll free at 1-866-456-0100 or Visit Schorr Law’s Website

Posted in Healthcare Reform
Tags: Healthcare Reform, Medical Mistakes