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  1. Home
  3. Patients' And Physicians' Attitudes Regarding The Disclosure Of Medical Errors.
  1. Home
  3. Patients' And Physicians' Attitudes Regarding The Disclosure Of Medical Errors.

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Patients' and physicians' attitudes regarding the disclosure of medical errors.

Thomas H Gallagher1, Amy D Waterman, Alison G Ebers

  • 1Department of Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine, 1959 NE Pacific St, Box 356178, Seattle, WA 98195-0001, USA. thomasg@u.washington.edu

JAMA
|February 25, 2003

View abstract on PubMed

Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Patients and physicians have unmet needs after medical errors. Patients desire full disclosure and emotional support, including apologies, which physicians often hesitate to provide due to legal concerns.

Keywords:
Empirical ApproachProfessional Patient Relationship

Related Experiment Videos

Area of Science:

  • Medical error disclosure
  • Patient safety
  • Healthcare communication

Background:

  • Medical errors are unavoidable in healthcare.
  • Patient and professional organizations recommend error disclosure.
  • Understanding patient and physician perspectives on discussing medical errors is crucial.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate patient and physician attitudes towards medical error disclosure.
  • To identify discrepancies between patient desires and physician practices in error communication.
  • To explore emotional needs of both patients and physicians following medical errors.

Main Methods:

  • Qualitative analysis of focus group transcripts.
  • Inclusion of 52 patients and 46 physicians in 13 focus groups.
  • Exploration of attitudes, information disclosure, and emotional needs related to medical errors.

Main Results:

  • Both patients and physicians reported unmet emotional needs post-error.
  • Patients desired comprehensive disclosure of harmful errors, including cause and prevention strategies.
  • Physicians disclosed adverse events but often omitted error specifics and prevention details, fearing legal implications; they also lacked support for their own distress.

Conclusions:

  • Physicians may not fully meet patient expectations for information and emotional support after harmful errors.
  • Enhancing communication regarding error nature, cause, and prevention is recommended.
  • Healthcare institutions should support the emotional well-being of clinicians involved in medical errors.