Family doctors say labs make mistakes in clinical testing 40% of the time
Mistakes involving laboratory tests have adverse consequences three times out of four, causing the patient physical or emotional harm in 18% of cases, according to a new study based on a survey of family practices.
The poll found a wide variety of errors. More than 40% of them were the fault of the lab, doctors reported, which either did the wrong test or did it incorrectly (18%) or failed to notify the right person about the results (25%).
Errors in interpreting test results were said to be very rare (0.3%)
The survey, reported in the June issue of Quality and Safety in Health Care, involved voluntary responses from 243 clinicians taking part in the American Academy of Family Physicians’ National Research Network. Doctors and office staff reported on their own experience.
If the study was published in June, why is it making headlines now? Because the lead author’s institution (the University of Chicago) sent out a press release.
The survey authors acknowledge that they left it up to respondents to define “test error”. Doctors have widely varying perceptions of how to define the term, according to another study.
It may be a good idea to enlist nurses and office staff to monitor and report errors, University of Vermont researchers suggest in an article recently published in the International Journal for Quality Health Care.
For a topic like this, the perfect place to look for more information is SearchMedica’s new Practice Management option. Find it among the tabs above the main search box.
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