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Tuesday, March 06, 2007

Ind. Law. - "State to release report on medical errors"

The Indianapolis Star has a brief item this morning:

Gov. Mitch Daniels and State Health Commissioner Dr. Judy Monroe today will release a report detailing medical errors at Indiana hospitals and clinics. The governor - who issued an order two years ago requiring the disclosure - will be joined by state lawmakers and health officials.
The news conference is set for 11:00 a.m.

The Evansville Courier & Press has a lengthy story today, accompanied by a list of reportable errors. A quote from the main story:

"We felt it was very important this group of hospital leaders make sure we convey that information ahead of time," said Harry Smith, the president and CEO of Deaconess Hospital, during a press conference Monday on the St. Mary's campus.

"Our goal now is to be transparent, to make sure we learn from other institutions, to make sure we thoroughly discuss within our own institutions and make sure we don't have punitive measures that prevent this reporting."

Indiana is the second state in the nation, after Minnesota, to require institution-specific reporting of errors that are considered preventable. Reports include the name of the institution, which of 27 defined errors occurred and in what quarter of the year.

Smith said Deaconess Health System had about 25,000 hospital admissions and 100,000 emergency department visits in 2006. He said the three reportable errors included:

- An elderly patient with a do not resuscitate order was allowed to die after a tube that was supposed to be inserted through the nose into the patient's stomach was instead inserted into the patient's lung, and the patient stopped breathing.

- A female patient on the adult mental health unit suffered a broken nose and significant bruising when a male patient hit her without warning.

- A patient admitted to the emergency department after falling and hitting his head on his garage floor fell and hit his head on the floor of a hospital bathroom. Although a technician was holding the patient's arm, the patient twisted out of the technician's grasp.

The patient died of a cerebral hemorrhage nine days later. Whether the first or second fall caused the hemorrhage is unclear.

The Fort Wayne Journal Gazette has this story, that begins:
Parkview Hospital employees committed five serious medical errors in 2006, officials confirmed one day ahead of the release of a new state report.

Lutheran Hospital was responsible for one serious error during the same period, a spokeswoman said.

The errors from both local hospital groups are listed on the Medical Errors Reporting System report – issued under an executive order signed by Gov. Mitch Daniels. The governor’s order requires all Indiana hospitals, ambulatory surgery centers, birthing centers and abortion clinics to publicly report any serious errors made in patient care.

For background, see this Dec. 18, 2005 ILB entry headed "Indiana's hospitals to report medical-errors beginning January 1st," which has a great deal of information (also the Star link is no longer operative), including links to earlier entries and the Executive Order.

Note: I just unsuccessfully attempted to use the Indiana State Department of Health website with a Firefox browser; apparently it is only designed for the Microsoft browser, which appears to be a big oversight.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on March 6, 2007 10:08 AM
Posted to Indiana Law