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AUGUSTA (WGME/AP) -- A new state report shows mixed results when it comes to serious errors, injuries and accidents in Maine hospitals and other health care facilities.
The Department of Health and Human Services has required hospitals, surgery centers, kidney centers and intermediate care facilities to report "sentinel events" since 2004.
Our media partner, The Sun-Journal, reports that the latest figures, for 2012, show two people had the wrong body part operated on, 14 had something left behind in their bodies during surgery and 36 died in a hospital setting of something they weren't expected to die from.
The wrong body part figure was unchanged from 2011. The number of items left behind during surgery dropped by two, while the number of unanticipated deaths dropped by 25.
Hospital-acquired infections alone kill 90,000 people a year in the U.S. They increase the length of hospital stays and cost $6 billion annually, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
Scary huh? Can you imagine, having surgery then getting an Xray done only for them to say you have a small pair of scissors inside you, or gauze and I am sure many other things have been found and never brought to anyones attention. If that is only Maine's report, what about other states that have a bigger population and the hospital's are a lot larger than Augusta, Maine, for instance. I wonder, what about MA General, now there is a large hospital with a great rating as far as I know, but, I would like to see there error report!
The Department of Health and Human Services has required hospitals, surgery centers, kidney centers and intermediate care facilities to report "sentinel events" since 2004.
Our media partner, The Sun-Journal, reports that the latest figures, for 2012, show two people had the wrong body part operated on, 14 had something left behind in their bodies during surgery and 36 died in a hospital setting of something they weren't expected to die from.
The wrong body part figure was unchanged from 2011. The number of items left behind during surgery dropped by two, while the number of unanticipated deaths dropped by 25.
Hospital-acquired infections alone kill 90,000 people a year in the U.S. They increase the length of hospital stays and cost $6 billion annually, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
Scary huh? Can you imagine, having surgery then getting an Xray done only for them to say you have a small pair of scissors inside you, or gauze and I am sure many other things have been found and never brought to anyones attention. If that is only Maine's report, what about other states that have a bigger population and the hospital's are a lot larger than Augusta, Maine, for instance. I wonder, what about MA General, now there is a large hospital with a great rating as far as I know, but, I would like to see there error report!
