scholarly journals Medical error: concept, characterization and management

2019 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 255-266
Author(s):  
Vitor Mendonça ◽  
Thomas Gallagher ◽  
Nicholas Hendryx

Abstract The objective of this study is to better understand the tensions involved in the fear of making an error due to the harm and risk this would pose to those involved. This is a qualitative study based on the narratives of the experiences lived by ten acting physicians in the state of São Paulo, Brazil. The concept and characterization of errors were discussed, as well as the fear of making an error, the near misses or error in itself, how to deal with errors and what to do to avoid them. The analysis indicates an excessive pressure in the medical profession for error-free practices, with a well-established physician-patient relationship to facilitate the management of medical errors. The error occurs but the lack of information and discussion often leads to its concealment due to fear of possible judgment by society or peers. The establishment of programs that encourage appropriate medical conduct in the event of an error requires coherent answers for humanization in Brazilian medical science.

PEDIATRICS ◽  
1977 ◽  
Vol 60 (2) ◽  
pp. 243-243
Author(s):  
Gorovitz ◽  
MacIntyre ◽  

At present, the typical patient is systematically encouraged to believe that his physician will not make a mistake, even though what the physician does may not achieve the desired medical objectives, and even though it cannot be denied that some physicians do make mistakes. The encouragement of this inflated belief in the competence of the physician is of course reinforced by the practice of not keeping systematic and accessible records of medical error. Yet everyone knows that this is a false confidence . . . the current high incidence of iatrogenic illness constitutes a medical problem of enormous proportions, well recognized within government agencies and segments of the medical profession, but only dimly suspected by the public at large. There is still a relatively high probability of a patient suffering from medical error. What patients and the public have to learn is to recognize, accept, and respond reasonably to the necessary fallibility of the individual physician. The physician-patient relationship has to be redefined as one in which necessarily mistakes will be made, sometimes culpably, sometimes because of the state of development of the particular medical sciences at issue, and sometimes, inevitably, because of the inherent limitations in the predictive powers of an enterprise that is concerned essentially with the flourishing of particulars, of individuals. The patient and the public therefore must also understand that medical science is committed to the patient's prospering and flourishing, and that the treatment of the patient is itself a part of that science and not a mere application of it.


Author(s):  
Jordan Mason

Abstract Recent literature on the ethics of medical error disclosure acknowledges the feelings of injustice, confusion, and grief patients and their families experience as a result of medical error. Substantially less literature acknowledges the emotional and relational discomfort of the physicians responsible or suggests a meaningful way forward. To address these concerns more fully, I propose a model of medical error disclosure that mirrors the theological and sacramental technique of confession. I use Aquinas’ description of moral acts to show that all medical errors are evil, and some accidental medical errors constitute venial sins; all sin and evil should be confessed. As Aquinas urges confession for sins, here I argue that confession is necessary to restore physicians to the community and to provide a sense of absolution. Even mistakes for which physicians are not morally culpable ought to be confessed in order to heal the physician–patient relationship and to address feelings of professional distress. This paper utilizes an Episcopal theology of confession that affirms verbal admission and responsibility-taking as freeing and relationally restoring acts, arguing that a confessional stance toward medical error both leads to better outcomes in physician–patient relationships and is more compassionate toward physicians who err.


2016 ◽  
Vol 157 (17) ◽  
pp. 680-684 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ilona Gaal

Internet became an inevitable phenomenon in the physician–patient relationship. The author analyzes it in two theoretical models: the effects on the medical profession and the interference with the decision making process. These will help to explain why patients search the internet for information about their illness, cure and their doctors. Some physicians dislike this, and they are not just worried about the patient, but about their own position and time. This fear is groundless, even if the internet patient can be hard to tackle in the daily routine. Internet can be seen not only as a necessary evil, but with proper communication skills physicians can benefit from their patients’ passion to internet. Orv. Hetil., 2016, 157(17), 680–684.


2005 ◽  
Vol 54 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ignacio Carrasco De Paula ◽  
Nunziata Comoretto

Sempre più frequentemente è richiesto al medico di giustificare le proprie decisioni in funzione dei fini e dei valori rilevanti nella medicina. In una medicina realmente centrata sull’uomo, il fine dell’attività medica è nella realizzazione del bene del paziente, mediante un agire adeguato non solo alla salute, ma all’intero essere del paziente, che lo consideri per il valore, infinito, che gli è proprio. Tale concezione antropologica implica, a livello pratico, che non è mai consentita di una persona la discriminazione - trattarla secondo criteri differenti da quelli che derivano dalla sua natura -, la strumentalizzazione - usarla per altri fini, diversi dal bene proprio della stessa - e l’oppressione - agire nei confronti di essa mortificando o tenendo in scarso conto la sua irrinunciabile autonomia e libertà. In una medicina centrata sul paziente il rapporto medico-paziente non è uno strumento dell’attività medica, ma il luogo in cui si realizza l’attività medica. La medicina è il rapporto medico paziente, un rapporto interpersonale, asimmetrico, non definito dalla sola identificazione dei ruoli, ma dall’individuazione di un obiettivo comune. Rapporto medico-paziente non significa dunque semplice “relazione”, ma implica una vera e propria “comunità”, concetto che richiama un’interazione tra le parti, o meglio, una condivisione. Alla base di un buon rapporto medico-paziente, identifichiamo almeno tre fattori: il riconoscimento dell’altro come persona, la costruzione di una vera e appropriata alleanza terapeutica, l’accettazione dei rispettivi ruoli. In conclusione, l’esercizio della professione medica non può prescindere dalla riflessione su quali siano i suoi scopi e, soprattutto, da una concezione antropologica di cosa sia l’uomo perché non ci rapportiamo con il paziente se non in relazione a questo. ---------- More and more frequently physician is required to justify his own decisions in accordance whit the goals and the important values of medicine. In a medicine really centred on patient, the goal of medical activity is the realization of the good of the patient, by acting not only according to health, but whit the whole being of patient, considering him for the value, endless, that is to him really. Such an anthropological conception implicates, to a practical level, that it is never allowed discrimination of the person - to treat him or her according to different criterions than those deriving from his or her nature -, the exploitation - to use him or her for other ends than proper good - and the oppression - to act towards him or her mortifying his or her autonomy and liberty. In a medicine centred on patient, the physician-patient relationship is not a tool of medical activity but the place in which medical activity comes true. The medicine is the physician-patient relationship, a relationship between two persons, asymmetrical, defined not only by the identification of the roles, but by singling out a common objective. Physician-patient relationship doesn’t mean simple relationship, but it implicates a real community, concept that recalls an interaction between the parts, or better, a sharing. At the base of a good physician-patient relationship we identify at least three factors: the recognition of the other as a person, the construction of a true and appropriate therapeutic alliance, the acceptance of the respective roles. In conclusion, the exercise of the medical profession cannot leave the reflection on what its purposes are out of consideration and, above all, an anthropological conception of what the man is because we behave to the patient in conformity with it.


Author(s):  
Guobin CHENG

LANGUAGE NOTE | Document text in Chinese; abstract also in English.本文首先對中國傳統醫學生活的結構和運動模式兩個方面進行了探討,借此提出以下觀點:中國傳統的醫患倫理關係並不是一種典型的職業倫理關係,它建立在中國傳統醫學學術和社會生活的基礎之上,其道德效力整合於這種特定的生活境遇之中;醫生與病人都被整合在社會倫理關係的網路之中,醫患關係根據醫病雙方各自具體的社會倫理身份以及具體的醫療活動場景的不同而運動變化。這樣一種倫理關係使中國傳統醫學生活充滿了矛盾:醫家雖然將醫學稱為“奪造化之權,以救人生死”《醫學源流論˙醫非人人可學論》的大“道”,但又必須承認其在現實性上是一種“持方技以事上”的小“術”,苦苦掙扎在崇高的道德責任感和低下的自我倫理認知之間;病家既保有一種有限的選擇和評價醫生、干預診療活動的自主權,又必須遵循社會倫理法則來認識和調整與醫生的關係,在和醫生的相互角力中維護自己的權益。傳統醫學道德過於追求高尚而遠離普通醫生的生活實際,這就大大消弱了它對現實生活的指導力量,無助於建立一種合理的職業倫理規範,更違背了中國傳統倫理學“德得相通”的最高道德原則。Using examples from ancient texts, this paper contends that the traditional physician-patient relationship should be understood and interpreted within the matrix of the social and ethical network of a society. As such, the physician-patient relationship is not what we call “a professional relationship,” in that there is no fixed or objective standard to qualify it. In the Confucian tradition, for instance, the physician-patient relationship changes according to the social identity of the patient. The moral responsibility of the physician also becomes ambiguous when he or she is required to treat the patient as a “relative” or “friend.” The patient, in contrast, has a very limited “autonomy,” if there is such a thing, to choose his or her own doctors and make medical decisions. The same situation can be seen in Daoist medical practice when the physician has to struggle between the “Dao of medicine” and the “skill of medicine,” or between the moral dimension of medicine and the efficaciousness of medicine. The medical profession in the past was never an independent entity with independent ethical standards, and has always been part of a wider value system.Because of this, when medical professionals nowadays try to adopt Western ideas underpinned by different principles and theories, they find moral clashes between two traditions due to their conflicting value systems. As a result, concepts such as “patient rights” are at odds with the traditional understanding of the physician-patient relationship, which emphasizes context and situation. This paper also criticizes virtue-based morality in China, contending that principle-based morality would be better for reconstructing a more objective standard of morality for medical professionals in China.DOWNLOAD HISTORY | This article has been downloaded 207 times in Digital Commons before migrating into this platform.


Author(s):  
Beata Antoszewska

This paper is an attempt to examine the senses and meanings attributed by physicians to the medical profession. The collected material is part of a larger project devoted to the physician-patient relationship reconstructed on the basis of individual narrations provided by physicians. The conducted research is closely linked to the qualitative perspective: Interpretative Paradigm and Interpretive Paradigm. The study was performed in the period 2015-2017. The examined group consisted of 16 subjects (6 female and 10 male physicians) from several provinces of Poland who were highly esteemed (subjective opinions) by their patients. The empirical data were collected by means of narrative interviews and the methodology applied for the analysis of the content was that of phenomenography.


2006 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luigi Anolli ◽  
Fabrizia Mantovani ◽  
Alessia Agliati ◽  
Olivia Realdon ◽  
Valentino Zurloni ◽  
...  

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