Medical Error Reporting

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Decision-making processes are the foundation for the nexus of legal, ethical, and social issues related to medical error reporting. The need to improve patient safety can be recognized as a public health issue and society should take active measures to decrease the number of deaths caused by medical errors (Guillod, 2013). This public health issue can only be addressed by including the ethical and moral dilemma in decision-making processes. There are emerging legal frameworks in several countries that have legislation regarding medical error reporting. However, legislation on its own is insufficient because of the moral and professional requirements for disclosing errors are perceived as substandard and unsafe by healthcare professionals (Ahern …show more content…

Society recognizes that laws have become a primary tool to pressure and pursue personal and professional behaviors. However, sometimes laws are criticized for not accomplishing their intended goal, for example, the law did not alter personal behavior to conform to societal norms. In general, laws have mandated, promoted, deterred some human behaviors and provide empirical evidence that laws to work in regulating such behavior (Watson & O'Connor, 2015). Society, therefore, should seek to enact laws and regulations to decrease the death toll from medical errors by enhancing the system for medical error reporting to promote patient safety. In addition to laws the former culture of professionalism (medical professionals do not make mistakes) should be transformed to a culture of safety, free from fear and defensiveness, and promoting an attitude of openness and willingness to learn and make changes (Anderson, 2018). This process will require society at large to change how we educate and train healthcare professionals to improve communication and sensitivity to medical error …show more content…

civil law code. Civil liability of HCO and healthcare professionals is associated and based on individual fault and negligence. Civil liability allows for the victim to be compensated and to prevent future occurrences, however, this creates a culture of secrecy (Cleary & Duke, 2017). Traditional legal advice to healthcare professionals has been to neither disclose errors nor to apologize for errors that result in patient injuries in fear of being held legally liable. According to Watson & O'Connor (2015), for instance, in countries, including the U.S., it is seen as a duty to disclose medical errors as part of a general legal norms contract. An example is in Switzerland, the healthcare-patient relationship is regulated by the contract of agency. The contract of agency includes disclosure and apology laws known as disclosure-with-offer mandates medical errors that occur in specific conditions must be reported and compensation must be made with no other repercussion to the healthcare institution or individual unless evidence of gross negligence is presented. The disclosure-with-offer program that Swiss law has enacted has proved a systemic process for reporting medical errors, offers compensation to the patient or family and decreases healthcare costs. The disclosure-with-offer program has also eliminated undesirable legal consequences for

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