Numbers Game A bit of a controversy has emerged in the wake of the 1999 Institute of Medicine report on medical errors To Err is Human , about whether the 98,000 deaths attributed to medical accidents per year is a realistic number.
Mistakes are the problem.
They have been for years. According to the paper, the risk to patients and the liability to prescribers inherent in poor handwriting, improper use of abbreviations and terminology, allergic reactions and other common prescribing problems could be dramatically reduced by the widespread adoption of currently available technology. In spite of multiple deaths reported in the lay and professional literature, fatal accidents involving intrathecal vincristine continue to occur. Each syringe must be placed into an overwrap which also must have this labeling. The most common error reported is incorrect dose, attributed to failure to weigh the child, illegible prescriptions, incorrect or ambiguous ordering details, and verbal orders.