Bharat Kumar, MD, MME, FACP, RhMSUS | Issue: May 2023 |
The 1999 Institute of Medicine report To Err Is Human gave a sobering depiction of the magnitude and consequences of medical error.1 The report concluded that approximately 98,000 people die in hospitals annually due to preventable medical errors. Of all the errors detailed in this report, diagnostic errors have since been determined to be the…
Case Ms. A is an 82-year-old woman who presented to the rheumatology office for evaluation of osteoporosis. She had been diagnosed with postmenopausal osteoporosis at age 62 after sustaining a right wrist fracture. She was started on alendronate 70 mg weekly and reported medication compliance. At age 79, she sustained an atraumatic right femur fracture….
She wanted me to call in an antibiotic. My sister, a lawyer, often tells me how the ethics of her profession govern even her extra-professional acts. She feels that when she was sworn into the New York State bar, she lost the freedom to bend the truth. She would never, for example, attempt to smuggle…
On Dec. 27, 2017, RaDonda Vaught killed Charlene Murphey, allegedly. Ms. Murphey was a lifelong resident of Gallatin, a suburb of Nashville, Tenn. She was well known from having worked at the local Walmart for 24 years, before she retired in 2012, when she was 65 years old.1 On Dec. 24, 2017, she was helping…