Communication breakdowns among health care providers often contribute to preventable medical errors. In a complex health care landscape where multiple specialists may be involved in a patient’s care, ...

True or false? A trip to the doctor’s is guaranteed to make you feel better. The answer is false, unfortunately, as all-too-common issues like medical errors can send patients home feeling worse than ...

In nursing school, you learn to avoid mistakes at all costs, as medical errors can result in physical injury or even death.

Shortly before shift change, a patient with cirrhosis is admitted with spontaneous bacterial peritonitis, a dangerous but treatable abdominal infection. The admitting provider orders the appropriate ...

Medication mistakes — in which the wrong drug or the wrong dose is given to a patient — are among the most common errors in medicine. John Wiederspan is well aware of how things can go wrong in the ...

Peter Schwartz, MD, was chair of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at a hospital in Reading, Pennsylvania, in the mid-1990s when a young physician sought him out. The doctor, whom Schwartz ...

How do medical errors occur? Any discussion of medical errors must take into consideration both individual and systemic factors. In health care, individual actors are responsible for their own actions ...

Medical errors are an unfortunate reality in healthcare systems worldwide, including Australia. Despite our advanced medical practices, mistakes can and do happen - sometimes with devastating ...

A female Pharmacist scanning pill box. Barcode technology can reduce medication errors by ensuring that the right drug is administered to the right patient at the right time, in the right dose, using ...

For a fourth year in a row, Maryland recorded an increase in reported medical mistakes, including some that were fatal, the state’s Department of Health said in its annual patient safety report. The ...