By Paul Rheingold
Unlike in the United States, English medical authorities maintain a national data base of reports of medical mishaps. A recent article reports on analysis of six years of data relating to drug errors made by health care professionals there.(British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology, 2011)
The results of this study are startling! Almost 10% of all the types of incident reports involve drug errors-the wrong drug, or too much or too little. Many of these resulted in deaths or serious injuries and the doctors rightly believed that all of these mishaps were avoidable. Indeed, following simple guidelines would avoid much error.
It is a common basis for a call to our office regarding some sort of medication error in a person receiving medical treatment. It is our practice to obtain the pharmacy and medical records and then try to determine if there was medical fault in the drug practice involved. Physicians and hospitals are not quick to admit mistakes. If you or someone close to you has been harmed because of medical malpractice, contact our firm and you can expect an aggressive defense against the claims you make.
