Strategies for Reducing Medical Errors in Patient Care
According to a Johns Hopkins analysis of the medical death rate during an eight-year period, more than 250,000 deaths a year could be attributed to medical error. Each year, great strides are made in the medical community to improve patient safety. Continued research and development are necessary not only in hospitals but also in public and private medical practices. Here, we discuss a few strategies that are being implemented to achieve this.
Encourage a culture of reliability.
First and foremost, it is vital that the medical community develop an environment in which accountability is encouraged. The line here is that it is far too easy to lean to a “punishment” type of environment in which medical providers are actually discouraged from accurate reporting. The rule of proper accountability is to focus on behaviors rather than care providers.
Reliability is also a cornerstone of adequate medical care, and there may be no better way to achieve the highest standards of reliability than for each medical provider to have an in-depth familiarity with human anatomy. Training is something that never stops for the medical professional. Med Ed Labs has been established to support physicians and staff in their quest to improve quality of care while simultaneously reducing the risk of medical errors. Although numerous VR platforms have been developed to assist medical students in their training, they are not and should not be perceived as a substitute for human cadaver training.
Interdisciplinary Collaboration
In just about every instance of patient care, there is a chain. Where there is a handoff of patient care from one provider to another, communication will always be a critical point; one at which medical errors could happen. Quality assurance experts have observed positive […]