Dec 5, 2007 12:19 am US/Eastern
Study: Most Doctors Don't Report Serious Mistakes
BOSTON (CBS) ―
When you go to the doctor, you'd like to think you're in good hands.
But we might not be, and what's worse is that other doctors might not be doing anything to prevent it.
A study by researchers at Boston's Mass General Hospital has found that nearly half of doctors don't report their colleagues, when they make serious medical mistakes.
Between November of 2003 and June of 2004 researchers mailed a survey and a $20 dollar incentive check to more than 3,000 doctors nationwide. About half of them answered.
96 percent of those doctors surveyed said doctors should always report impaired or incompetent colleagues. But only 54 percent of those who had witnessed such behavior by doctors in the past three years actually did so.
What's even worse is that, 93 percent of doctors surveyed said doctors should always report serious medical errors, but only 54 percent of them who'd seen such errors if the past years actually reported it.
Dr. David Blumenthal, the director of the Institute for Health Policy, at Mass General hospital says that "while there is no excuse for not reporting a mistake... the system doesn't make it easy, either." Doctors who report problems risk being sued, as well as losing referrals.
To add insult to injury, 21 doctors who didn't answer the survey still cashed the $20 dollar check.
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