New York patients should know that an estimated 7,000 people around the country die annually due to medication errors, and a total of about 1 million errors happen each year in U.S. hospitals. In one 2016 case, an 87-year-old woman was rushed to the emergency room due to a high fever, and her sister gave the ER doctor the woman’s medical history and a list of the medications she was on including some that had been recently added for cognitive issues.
New York patients should know that an estimated 7,000 people around the country die annually due to medication errors, and a total of about 1 million errors happen each year in U.S. hospitals. In one 2016 case, an 87-year-old woman was rushed to the emergency room due to a high fever, and her sister gave the ER doctor the woman’s medical history and a list of the medications she was on including some that had been recently added for cognitive issues.
However, when the woman’s son visited her after her discharge, he noticed that she seemed unusually tired, and he looked into her medication and learned that it had been changed. He also learned that his mother’s complete list of medications had not been entered into her electronic medical record, no one discussed the changes when she was discharged and her assisted living facility failed to follow up even though she paid a surcharge for medication management.
To avoid this, health advocates should always have multiple copies of loved one’s medications including dosages and other information. They should ensure that the information is correctly input when their loved one is hospitalized and review any changes on discharge with the hospital, the loved one’s primary care physician and the assisted living facility if applicable.
In this case, it was possible to get the woman back on the correct medication and the side effect of fatigue went away, but often, the wrong medication can cause a worsened medical condition. A person could have an allergic reaction, or there could be an even more serious reaction such as a stroke. A medication error could be life-altering or fatal. A person who is harmed due to a medication error may want to discuss the situation with an attorney in order to see if filing a medical malpractice lawsuit would be advisable.
