3 Easy Ways to Prevent Becoming a Victim of Medical Errors

They’re not meant to happen, but they do happen more often than we’d like them to. Medical errors are rampant in not just the USA, but all over the world. They’re not all caused by negligence from the medical community; some happen because doctors and nurses are overworked and too tired to make the right decision, but others do happen because of the patient’s oversight or negligence. While some errors are easily rectified, others carry a heavy price – you end up spending more money, spending more time at the hospital or in recovery, suffering a relapse, becoming disabled, and in the worst case, losing your life. So if you or a family member needs medical attention, here’s what you can do to prevent becoming a victim of medical errors:

• Know the right questions to ask: Read up on your condition or the surgery you’re scheduled for before you visit the doctor. There are many trustworthy sites on the Internet that provide reliable information on various diseases and conditions and on the precautions you need to take before and after surgeries. Ask your doctor any question you may have about your condition – what you can do to hasten your recovery, how your medication must be taken, and so on. Be prepared with your questions because your doctor may be busy and so may not have too much time to spend with you.

• Provide the right information: If you don’t provide your doctor with your accurate medical history, you have no one else to blame if you end up on the wrong side of a medical error. Tell your doctor about the medications you’re on, any allergies you may have, any prior or chronic conditions like diabetes and blood pressure, and any other detail that is even remotely relevant to your present condition. When you provide the right information, you enable your doctor to make the right decisions for your treatment.

• Understand what your medical provider has to say: It’s important that you understand your doctor’s instructions clearly and follow them to the letter if you want to prevent medical errors. If you’re not sure or if you have any doubts, don’t hesitate to ask again. Some people tend to mess up because they heed others’ advice on how best to go about their recuperation instead of following what the doctor ordered. But if you want to avoid a relapse or side effects, the only way is to do as you’ve been told by your medical provider.

Medicine is not magic – it’s a method that works as long as certain rules are followed. And when they’re adhered to, the chances of errors reduce drastically.

By-line:
This guest post is contributed by Maryanne Osberg, who writes on the topic of Becoming A Nurse Practitioner . She welcomes your comments at her email id: mary.anne579<@>gmail<.>com.

Study: California Nurse-Patient Ratios Lead to Better Patient Outcomes

While we continue to push for greater improvements in health care practice and delivery, we should still take time to stop and be grateful for the improvements that have already taken place in certain states through dedicated advocacy. You will recall that in 1999, California became the first state in the nation to mandate minimum nurse-to-patient ratios. These ratios were phased in between 2004 and 2008. According to a report by California Healthline, California's mandatory nurse-patient ratios have helped create a decline in 30-day inpatient mortality rates.

California's landmark law set parameters that included the following nurse-patient ratios for acute care facilities:

· Nurses must not care for more than six patients in a psychiatric unit

· Nurses must not care for more than five patients in a medical-surgical unit

· Nurses must not care for more than four pediatric patients

· Nurses must not care for more than three patients in a labor & delivery unit.

· Nurse must not care for more than two intensive care patients

The idea behind the law was to relieve overburdened nursing staff so that they can be more attentive to individual patients, thereby helping to produce better patient outcomes. Many in the health care field were eager to see if this law would help produce the desired results. Now, according to a study supported by the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation and the NIH's National Institute of Nursing Research, those positive outcomes have been confirmed.

The principal findings of the study were that lower nurse-to-patient ratios like those required in California are associated with significantly lower patient mortality. Also of note is that nurses with lower nurse-patient ratios reported less burnout and job dissatisfaction, which is something to think about when taking the nationwide nursing shortage into consideration. Nurses also reported in the study that they provided a better quality of care to patients when working with lower ratios. The study concluded that low ratios are "predictive of better nurse retention in California and in other states where they occur."

A few other states have enacted laws that mandate lower nurse-patient ratios; other states are considering bills that would do the same. There's even nurses advocating for Congress to mandate a federal standard for nurse-patient rations.

Do you advocate for safe nurse-patient ratios in your state or for a nationwide mandate? Why or why not?

By-line:

This guest post is contributed by Kitty Holman, who writes on the topics of nursing schools. She welcomes your comments at her email Id: kitty.holman20@gmail.com.