Health Safety Guru Says That Current Approach to Dealing With Medical Mistakes Is "Nuts"

The Wall Street Journal's Health Blog reports of a proposal from a health safety "guru" at Johns Hopkins to reduce the number of health care mistakes. He proposes bringing certain big health care players together to identify common problems and propose solutions. As a broad concept its hard to find fault with that approach. However, it will be important to come up with actual guidelines, standards. Too often the health care community comes up with "practice guidelines" (I'm talking to you ACOG) on how to deal with a given patient care situation, only to run from it later, i.e. during litigation, saying that such guidelines do not offer proof of the medical standard of care. Practice guidelines, many physicians would have you believe, are little more than suggestions which the doctor may or may not choose to follow. The problem is that many doctors really do need guidance, a set of standards to be followed in dealing with a difficult situation. No rule or set of rules can be crafted to address every conceivable circumstance. But, there are certainly some situations that arise time and again in various fields of medicine that can be dealt with by set, written standards. A violation of such standards which results in grievous harm and lose should result in compensation being provided to the patient and her family.