The Office of the Inspector General in a report prepared in 2010 found that 13.5% of Medicare recipients experienced adverse events during a hospitalization. These adverse events resulted in extended stays in the hospital, lifesaving intervention and caused permanent injury or death.
Eighty-six percent of the events which occurred were not reported within the facility’s own reporting system.
The Inspector General’s report recommends that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality develop a set of definite reportable events that must be reported under all circumstances. There is no excuse for failing to report medical errors. Saving one’s own skin does not take precedent over the safety of the public.