Hospitals Are Putting Patients at Risk

Patient safety incidents in U.S. hospitals have increased by three percent overall from 3002 to 2005. The error gap between the nation's best and worst performing hospitals has remained wide, according to a report.

America's top rated medical facilities had 40 percent lower rates of medical errors than the worst-performing hospitals, the study indicated.

The fourth annual HealthGrades Patient Safety in American Hospitals Study was released by HealthGrades, an independent health care ratings company. The study examined over 40 million Medicare hospitalization records at almost 5,000 hospitals from the 2003 to 2005 period.

"The cost of medical errors at American hospitals in both mortality and dollar terms continues to be significant, and the 'chasm in quality' between the nation's top and bottom hospitals, which HealthGrades has documented in this and other studies, remains." said Dr. Samantha Collier, HealthGrades' chief medical officer and the primary author of the study. "But the nation's best-performing hospitals are providing benchmarks for the hospital industry, exercising a vigilance that resulted in far fewer inhospital incidents among the Medicare patients studied."

According to the study, patient-safety incidents continue to rise in American hospitals. Over one million preventable patient safety incidents occurred over the three years of the study among Medicare patients in U.S. hospitals, an incidence rate of 2.86 percent.

Over 247,662 deaths were potentially preventable over the course of the three years. Medicare patients who had one or more patient safety incidents had a one in for chance in dying.

Then of the 16 patient safety incidents tracked got worse from 2003 to 2005, and the average rate was almost 12 percent. Seven incidents actually improved by an average of six percent.

The extra cost to hospitals was $8.6 billion over the three years. Patient safety incidents with the highest rates were decubitus ulcer, post-operative respiratory failure, and failure to rescue.