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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)

#91

Post by q1w2 »

willcipriano wrote: post #79
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…

> What qualifies as a medical error? If we just classified things that are obvious. Wrong medication applied (ie paper says to deliver 10mg of Advil but you got a vitamin C tablet), wrong leg amputated, wrong patient data looked at leading to a bad diagnosis. We would likely find a large number of incidents, however no way on earth will you get the American medical cartel to report on them honestly.

Calling doctors, collectively, the "American medical cartel" isn't helpful language. It's just more polarizing politics that breaks down constructive dialogue.

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

#93

Post by couchand »

seren wrote: post #85
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?

As far as I am aware, for every significant UI change we do at the medical device company I am working for, we bring a panel of final users (doctors and techs) to our facility and we have to do some validation tests, and finally show these validation results to the FDA before releasing the product.

Is your panel of end users self-selected, by chance?

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

#95

Post by anamexis »

q1w2 wrote: post #91
willcipriano wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What qualifies as a medical error? If we just classified things that are obvious. Wrong medication applied (ie paper says to deliver 10mg of Advil but you got a vitamin C tablet), wrong leg amputated, wrong patient data looked at leading to a bad diagnosis. We would likely find a large number of incidents, however no way on earth will you get the American medical cartel to report on them honestly.

Calling doctors, collectively, the "American medical cartel" isn't helpful language. It's just more polarizing politics that breaks down constructive dialogue.

I don’t see them referring to doctors as such.

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

#96

Post by q1w2 »

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 research fixates on the notion of "error/mistake" (because it's more easily quantifiable), but the reality is that most people do not get "optimal" care. In fact, in any given service, in any given industry, no one gets "optimal" care - that's just human nature. Doctors are humans.

It's also completely inefficient. Humans make judgement calls based on available resources. If everyone over 45 received "optimal" care, they would all effectively live in hospitals.

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

#97

Post by seren »

meragrin_ wrote: post #90
seren wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I am aware, for every significant UI change we do at the medical device company I am working for, we bring a panel of final users (doctors and techs) to our facility and we have to do some validation tests, and finally show these validation results to the FDA before releasing the product.

> we bring a panel of final users (doctors and techs) to our facility Are they the same group of people each time?

I am not really involved with these tests: I believe they are not the same people every time, because doctors tend to be quite busy, and don't have much free time available.

They are coming at least from different continents, but obviously to answer the sibling's comment they are selected by the company, from a pool of advanced users or early adopters, so not necessarily a good reflection of the whole population of final users.

And this is an issue in itself because the product is influenced by expert users, but at least, you cannot release a totally horrible or misleading UI that no user has ever seen before.

The other side effect, intended or not, is that you cannot change the UI at every iteration of the product because these tests tends to be costly, as a result, the evolution of the design is quite conservative, which might also explain in part why medical devices UI tends to look "outdated".

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

#98

Post by q1w2 »

anamexis wrote: post #95
q1w2 wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Calling doctors, collectively, the "American medical cartel" isn't helpful language. It's just more polarizing politics that breaks down constructive dialogue.

I don’t see them referring to doctors as such.

Who do you think is making the majority of these diagnostic errors?

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

#99

Post by rscho »

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.

I gather you are not a healthcare professional, hence the artificial dichotomy stemming from your perception as an outsider. Medical competency is very difficult to assess objectively. You're good/bad because people say so. There isn't any form of performance feedback.

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

#100

Post by KineticLensman »

numlock86 wrote: post #53
bloak wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think "age" is a valid cause of death. Old people are more likely to die than young people, but they still die from particular causes that should be distinguished and recorded. For people of any age it's not obvious how to record a combination of circumstances or a cascade of conditions. For example, a very common fate for old people is to fall, break a hip ("neck of femur"), be admitted into hospital, and th…

> I don't think "age" is a valid cause of death. Uhm, considering our technological advancement in the medical sector I'd argue "age" should be the only valid cause of death. Sadly it isn't for obvious reasons (firearms, car crashes, everything else related to safety etc., hunger, lack of medical equipment and supplies etc. etc. etc.) ... and ironically the article is one of those causes that could and should be easi…

> Uhm, considering our technological advancement in the medical sector I'd argue "age" should be the only valid cause of death.

For this to be true we would have to be able to predict and treat every possible disease and condition, wherever it occurred.

When I had my Ventricular Fibrillation event I was lucky that it occurred just outside the door of a place that had a defibrillator. If it had occurred twenty minutes later I would have been on my own in the countryside. No amount of credible technological advancement would have saved me then.

Oh, and there are quite a few cancers and other diseases for which there is no known cure.

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