21% of Americans Experience Medical Errors

摘要

Arecent survey showed that 21% of Americans report having personally experienced a medical error. When the errors occur, they often have a lasting impact on the patient's physical and emotional health, financial well-being or family relationships, the survey showed. "The survey results show that Americans recognize that patient safety is a critically important, but complex, issue," said Tejal K. Gandhi, chief clinical and safety officer at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI) and president of the IHI/National Patient Safety Foundation Lucian Leape Institute, which organized the survey with the National Opinion Research Center at the Univer-sity of Chicago.