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Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in U.S. (2016)

hopkinsmedicine.org

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Re: Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in U.S. (2016)

#151

Post by deltaonefour »

starkd wrote: post #143
giantg2 wrote: post #67

“Incidence rates for deaths directly attributable to medical care gone awry haven’t been recognized in any standardized method for collecting national statistics,” That's because they're hard to standardize. What qualifies as a medical error? It's easy to go back after the fact and analyze a case where someone has a poor outcome and say 'we should have done this another way'. That doesn't mean there was any indicatio…

The article stresses that all medical errors are not necessarily due to bad doctors. It's also bad coordination between different services, miscommunication, etc. Dr. Makary points out various process problems that are not necessarily the fault of any individual doctor.

It's still doctors. Doctors are responsible for coordination and miscommunication. They define the process, it's still on them.

Re: Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in U.S. (2016)

#152

Post by chiefalchemist »

nradov wrote: post #135
chiefalchemist wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. All the more reason to look for patterns of what works or what might not. The human body is complex. Why not look for as much help as possible?

We don't even know what all the factors are, and we don't have a practical or affordable way to gather and record all that data in a high-quality, consistent manner.

So we don't even start to try?

That's not a good enough reason.

Given the social and financial magnitude the excuse is nearly criminal.

Re: Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in U.S. (2016)

#153

Post by deltaonefour »

TaupeRanger wrote: post #121
ncmncm wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't know whether it is the case or not. It could just as easily be worse than it says. Probably is. If I had to tell you about all the medical mistakes experienced by just my immediate family, just the facts, I would be at it all day long.

Unless the mistakes led to death that wouldn't have otherwise occurred in a similar timeframe, the anecdotes wouldn't even be relevant.

Based off the fact that mistakes that lead to death are so high... If we had statistics on errors that didn't lead to death, the results would be an astronomically larger illustration of incompetence then Just mistakes that lead to death.

Re: Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in U.S. (2016)

#154

Post by deltaonefour »

TaupeRanger wrote: post #123
nenadst wrote: post #26

apparently based on very flawed arguments https://gidmk.medium.com/medical-error-is-not-the-third-lead...

Exactly. Every time I come to a medical thread on HN I realize how bad even intelligent people are at understanding medical statistics and recognizing when to raise an eyebrow of skepticism. It really does take a lot of study and/or professional training to develop those skills.

Interesting. I would be one of those people who can't fully understand the accuracy of these numbers, so I have to take other peoples' word for it.

Are you part of the medical field yourself? If so then I wouldn't trust anything you say given that if the statistics were true, what you're saying has a high chance of just covering yourself up.

Re: Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in U.S. (2016)

#155

Post by slowhand09 »

rscho wrote: post #142
pnutjam wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe "wary" is the work you're looking for. This means the are guarded and maybe suspicious. Weary means tired.

Yes thanks, autocorrect :-)

*"ought-to-correct""

Re: Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in U.S. (2016)

#156

Post by roenxi »

causi wrote: post #89
giantg2 wrote: post #67

“Incidence rates for deaths directly attributable to medical care gone awry haven’t been recognized in any standardized method for collecting national statistics,” That's because they're hard to standardize. What qualifies as a medical error? It's easy to go back after the fact and analyze a case where someone has a poor outcome and say 'we should have done this another way'. That doesn't mean there was any indicatio…

I'm a little skeptical that there are legitimately 250k that result in unnecessary death each year From purely anecdotal experience, that number is totally believable. Again anecdotally, the medical field seems to only have two kinds of people, the extraordinarily competent and dedicated, and people who don't give a whiff of a shit. The medical bell curve looks more like a bathtub.

> and people who don't give a whiff of a shit

That doesn't mean that they make mistakes, some extremely competent workers just do what they're told. But I don't know of any evidence that hospitals have gone through the same engineered hardening process as heavy industry (eg, airlines) so I expect huge gaps between actual practice and what is possible. I've never seen a hospital process that looks to have been given an engineered finish & I don't think they have enough mathematicians floating around to squeeze for efficiencies.

Re: Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in U.S. (2016)

#157

Post by deltaonefour »

xtracto wrote: post #149
georgia_peach wrote: post #109

I believe it. In my 40+ years of dealing with the medical profession, Dr. Google, Dr. Wikipedia, & Dr. Pubmed have wiped the floor with them, time after time. If you get sick, do the research. I can almost guarantee that it will pay off. And these days, medical research is excellent--if only by volume. I know people here like their canned responses--" small n! ", " in mice !", " correlation != causation "--but when y…

People that have lived with a chronic disease have seen this first hand. I had specialist Doctors five up on me in frustration because they just dont know what's wrong with me. I've been to several doctors in 3 different countries during 20 years. You really comprehend that doctors are just humans, not too different from say, an IT professional trying to troubleshoot a failing PC.

The issue is if the IT professional fails too many times... he's let go. Does this happen to a doctor?

Re: Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in U.S. (2016)

#158

Post by jaywalk »

danachow wrote: post #134
sschueller wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is insane. These device UIs should be standardized and any manufacturer making a significant UI change to their product should not be permitted to sell it under the same name and number. The FDA should be looking at this before approving such devices for use. Don't aircraft have more or less standardized controls and displays?

> Don't aircraft have more or less standardized controls and displays? No, not really. There are similarities in avionics, bare minimum instrumentation and historical conventions but there are type ratings for commercial pilots - they train on each one specifically. Some aircraft are similar enough that they have “common type ratings”. But an Airbus and a Boeing look very different.

Boeing 737NG cockpit: https://cdn.wallpapersafari.com/16/15/2AyKUB.jpg

Airbus A320 cockpit: https://airbus-h.assetsadobe2.com/is/image/content/dam/produ...

They aren't very different. For normal flying, the biggest difference is that Boeings have yokes and Airbus uses sidesticks. The important stuff is all roughly the same.

Re: Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in U.S. (2016)

#159

Post by pdpi »

npteljes wrote: post #119
pdpi wrote: post #118

An important factor to consider any time you see really worrisome things like medical errors or suicide as leading causes of death: counter-intuitively, that can be good news. Every time you solve your #1 highest priority problem, your #2 becomes your new #1. At some point, if you have good-enough solution for a broad-enough range of problems, the only option left is that your biggest problem is now failing to apply…

This really is similar to the statistic of head protection increasing the number of head injuries. With the explanation being that otherwise, many of those injuries are deaths instead.

Yes. Another, really counterintuitive scenario is Abraham Wald's "reinforce the planes'armour in the places where you don't see bullet holes".

Re: Study Suggests Medical Errors Now Third Leading Cause of Death in U.S. (2016)

#160

Post by m0llusk »

Lots of these are drug interactions. Have a symptom? Here is a drug for that. Doctors rarely check and often are not aware of the potential for harm. Seniors taking 2-3 dozen drugs regularly are not uncommon and often feel much better when medications are removed from their regimen. Data science should be able to help at both ends connecting problems with drug interactions that trigger them and then warning of possible problems when considering or prescribing medicines.
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