Intended for healthcare professionals

Rapid response to:

News

Clinton acts to reduce medical mistakes

BMJ 2000; 320 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.320.7235.597 (Published 04 March 2000) Cite this as: BMJ 2000;320:597

Rapid Response:

Principles of Care?

The public discussion I hear on medical mistakes, while not
uninterested in gross acts of inattention or incompetence, fundamentally
are principles of care issues. What form(s) of intervention, assessment or
observation is appropiate for the need(s) being shown by symptoms or
feelings of illness. Standard formulary answers applied to the merely
consenting patient appear to leave much of the public feeling and sensing
the actual healthcare they are receiving runs little beyond "take two
aspirins and call me in the morning" simply with different names on the
bottle (drug of choice). Medical mistakes include narrowness of thought
and approach, ignorance and/or disinterest in truly strengthening a
patients coping skills naming just two. Our healthcare system is
profoundly weak often in it's ordinary humanity, legitimate humility and
respect despite all it's careful mannerisms and formal politenesses.
Perhaps reporting on this would be beyond Mr. Clinton's scope of practice.

Competing interests: No competing interests

05 March 2000
Ned Hoke
private practice
Calif/USA