That's the key to our public safety. The problem of medical errors was highlighted last week by the release of a report by the Institute of Medicine, part of the National Academy of Sciences. Several years ago, Kinnard represented the family of a diabetic man who was killed by an overdose of insulin. Kinnard said the nurse who gave the injection testified she couldn't read the doctor's handwriting on the order form. I am all for trying some sort of supervision like the one suggested in this report.
Some local doctors disagree.
We'd be a whole lot better off spending the money to get people together who want to get the right solutions . But he said the commission's recommendations are ''worth a try. Already in Tennessee there are a number of laws and regulations that address the problem. But the science of investigating and preventing medical errors is still in its infancy, state officials admit. Sloppy handwriting is not the only cause of medication errors.