Personal Injury Law

Medical Device Dangers Are Avoidable

Our attorneys have seen many cases in which patients are injured, sometimes severely, by healthcare professional in Georgia hospitals committing careless and preventable errors or by medical device defects.

The ECRI Institute recently released its annual list of top hospital medical device hazards for last year. The ECRI Institute, a nonprofit organization, dedicated to bringing the discipline of applied scientific research to discover which medical procedures, devices, drugs, and processes are best, in an effort to improve patient care. It is one of only a handful of organizations designated as both a Collaborating Center of the World Health Organization and an Evidence-Based Practice Center by the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

Updated annually, the list is based on problems reported to and investigated by ECRI and includes detailed descriptions and information on how to avoid such hazards.

The ECRI Institute?s 2008 list of most dangerous medical device hazards include:

1) Needlesticks and Other Sharps Injuries. Intravenous and other injection devices can cause injuries to physicians, patients, laboratory personnel, pharmacy staff, housekeeping personnel, and waste handlers by an exposed needle or other sharp. Consequences include serious cuts and exposure to blood borne pathogens such as HIV or the hepatitis B or C virus.

2) Air Embolism from Contrast Media Injectors. X-ray imaging of blood vessels where contrast media is injected into the patients vasculature and can create the risk of injecting air, potentially resulting in a fatal embolism.

3) Retained Devices and Un-retrieved Fragments Left in Patients: In these cases an entire device is left behind in surgery or a portion of a device breaks away within the patient. Sometimes, surgical items are intentionally placed in the patient, but can pose the risk of infection or burn hazards when the patient undergoes MRI examination.

4) Surgical Fires: Medical devices or other components can ignite, such as electrosurgical units; electrocautery devices; lasers and related disposable components; oxygen, which can ignite easily and burn intensely; and fuel, such as from fenestration towels and gowns.

5) Anesthesia Hazards due to Inadequate Pre-Use Inspection: These include serious problems such as misconnected breathing circuits, ventilator leaks, and empty gas cylinders.

6) Misleading Displays: Ambiguous or counterintuitive displays can create misinterpretation.

7) CT Radiation Dose: High doses can present an increased risk of cancer, possibly linked to 6,000 additional cancers a year, roughly half being fatal.

8) MR Imaging Burns: Patients become burned from the Magnetic Resonance Imaging technology.

9) Fiberoptic Light-Source Burns: Light sources used in endoscopes, retractors, and headlamps can cause burns to staff and patients from the light itself or from its heated cable connections.

Full post as published by Georgia Injury Lawyer Blog on March 27, 2009 (boomark / email).