Report Finds Most Errors at Hospitals Go Unreported

Another reason to get fit.

Hospital employees recognize and report only one out of seven errors, accidents and other events that harm Medicare patients while they are hospitalized, federal investigators say in a new report.

Yet even after hospitals investigate preventable injuries and infections that have been reported, they rarely change their practices to prevent repetition of the “adverse events,” according to the study, from Daniel R. Levinson, inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services.

Fit people generally require fewer hospitalizations and therefore less exposure to hospital-related risk.