Organizational Responsibility and Current Health Care Issues

Organizational Responsibility and Current Health Care Issues

Health care organizations are facing many issues today. These issues have a negative impact on the countries health care system. One example of a major issue health care faces are medical errors. Medical Error is defined as a "preventable adverse effect of care, whether or not it is evident or harmful to the patient. This might include an inaccurate or incomplete diagnosis or treatment of disease, injury, syndrome, behavior, infection or other ailment" (The Free Dictionary, 2011). Medical Errors are rising as one of the leading causes of death in the United States. Patient safety is a concern of growing importance that affects both patients and health care providers. This is also financially draining. The Institute of Medicine estimates "medical errors cost the Nation nearly $37.6 billion each year and that $17 billion of those costs are due to preventable errors" (Harrington, 2005). This can be caused by both human and system errors. This is a major issue because patients are apprehensive about their lives and safety in the hands of health care providers.

Background and Examples

Medical Errors became prominent in 1999, when the Institute of Medicine published a report "based on studies conducted in 1984 and 1992 that concluded 44,000 to 98,000 patients die every year in hospitals due to medical error" (Harrington, 2005). After the report was published the Institute of Medicine mandated that medical errors must be reported. In addition, the Institute of Medicine formed a set of recommendations to reduce errors. They emphasized that the "key to reducing medical errors is to focus on improving the systems of delivering care and not to blame individuals" (Harrington, 2005). It is the responsibility of the hospital to report any errors and have doctors, nurses, and other medical support staff establishes an error-reporting system that reduces medical errors.

An example of this is the incident that happened at "Rhode Island Hospital in November, 2007. The patient had surgery on the wrong side of the head. The CT scan showed bleeding on the left side and the neurosurgeon began drilling on the right side" (abcNEWS Health, 2011). Once the surgeon realized his mistake, he quickly closed up the hole and began performing surgery on the correct side. The patient survived; however, the hospital was fined $50,000 for its transgression. Two other patients at the same hospital had surgery on their heads, unfortunately one patient died three weeks later. The hospital has enforced new measures to prevent errors and promote patient safety; however they still do not know what went wrong and how this error was made.

Another example is the much publicized overdose of Dennis Quaid's twins. They were over dosed with heparin a blood thinning drug used to prevent blood clots. This accident happened at "Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. The hospital released a statement claiming this was a preventable error and they did not follow the proper procedure and protocol" (abcNEWS Health, 2011). Luckily, the children survived, especially because this is a potent drug and could potentially cause serious harm or even death to children and adults alike. There are also many medical errors in intensive care units as well. The intensive care unit is full of high emotions and tension. Each member of the staff is busy trying to treat patients as quickly as possible and to the best of his or her personal abilities.

New Strategies

"In the intensive care units nurses developed strategies that identifies, interrupt and correct medical errors and to minimize preventable adverse outcomes" (Henneman, Gawlinski, Blank, Henneman, Jordan, & McKenzie, 2010). In these intensive care units, nurses are emotional, and overworked, which also plays a major role in medical errors. If the system is not working, everything else will fail. These medical errors have patients nervous about going to the hospital for treatment and care. It violates patient rights to safety and autonomy by respecting the rights of patients because he or she may not be informed they could face harm in a medical error. It violates the ethics of nonmaleficence in that patients are experiencing harm in addition to the ethics beneficence because the patient is not being protected. This can lead to patient's view of the competency of doctors, nurses, and staff. The general population has faith in his or her doctors and nurses. The population is trusting, with their lives and that of their loved ones. Patients rely on doctors and nurses to perform correct surgeries, give them the proper care and