If effort to improve patient care and awareness, the federal government launched an online database to track patient feedback and medical malpractice or mistakes at local hospitals throughout the country. The list can be found on the website for the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services.
“We asked hospitals to report this information for two reasons: one, to focus on measurement and improvement, and two, so patients and consumers would have the information available,” an official with DHHS.
The database included some interesting admissions from hospitals in the South Carolina area. For example, the databases showed that at Piedmont Medical Center in Rock Hill, there was a rate four times higher than the national average for objects being left behind in patients’ bodies after surgery. The national rate was about 1 instance per about every 10,000 patients.
Before you go in for surgery or treatment, it may be a good idea to check out the database to see how your hospital ranks. If you are concerned by what you find, you could always reschedule your procedure at another health care facility.
Hopefully this online database will provide more transparency within the health care industry. It could also inspire hospitals to institute programs to eliminate medical negligence and encourage better treatment of patients.
Currently, there are far too many people injured or killed each year as a result of medical negligence, and that’s one of the reasons the database was created.