Medical Malpractice- Surgical Mistakes
Surgical Errors, Medical Malpractice
Undergoing surgery is never a pleasant experience. Each surgery has its risks and rewards, or we would not consider getting surgery as a form of health care. It is vitally important that the surgeon operate with precision, as even the most seemingly insignificant mistake can result in grave consequences for the patient. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there were over fifty million surgical procedures performed in the United States in 2007 alone, and sadly, a number of surgical mistakes did take place.
Some of the most common surgical errors include post operative and pre-operative infections, performing surgery on the wrong part of the body, or even on the wrong patient. Although it is difficult to believe that such a mistake as performing surgery on the wrong body part could occur in modern medicine, hundreds of people each year have the wrong leg, arm, side of the body, or even hemisphere of the brain operated on. Many surgical mistakes stem from oversights in pre-operative care, such as a false positive or a false negative report from a lab, or the surgeon fails to collect a complete medical history of the patient before the surgical procedure. Other surgical mistakes result from allergic or other adverse effects of medication. Perforations of internal organs by a scalpel or a laser can cause severe harm to a delicate organ. Severing a nerve is quite common, since the nervous system runs throughout the entire body and is extremely vulnerable. Some of the most common types of surgeries where surgical errors are likely to occur include gastric bypass, childbirth, cardiothoracic, thoracic surgery, laparoscopic intestinal surgery and plastic/cosmetic surgery. Finally, anesthesia errors can happen during surgery, with even a small error in dosage causing grave and potentially life-threatening consequences.
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