Personal Injury Law

New State Law Requires Report of Mistakes Made by Hospitals

By Bruce Stern

Last week, Governor Corzine signed legislation which requires public reporting of how often serious medical errors occur at individual hospitals throughout the states of New Jersey. The legislation also prohibits hospitals from charging patients for mistakes made by the hospital, which are currently not eligible for third-party reimbursement. The bill passed in both houses of the Legislature earlier this year, and had 65 sponsors comprised of Democrats and Republicans.
 

The new law requires notification of 14 specific instances of errors, including:

• A foreign object left during a procedure;
• Iatrogenic pneumothorax (leaving air in the chest cavity);
• Postoperative hip fracture;
• Postoperative hemorrhage or hematoma;
• Postoperative deep vein thrombosis or pulmonary embolism;
• Postoperative sepsis;
• Postoperative wound dehiscence (rupture);
• Accidental puncture of laceration;
• Transfusion reaction;
• Birth trauma;
• Obstetric trauma — vaginal delivery with instrument;
• Obstetric trauma — vaginal delivery without instrument;
• Air embolism; and
• Surgery on the wrong side, wrong body part, or wrong person, or wrong surgery performed on a patient.

Under the new law, if one of these errors occurs and a third-party, such as an insurance carrier, Medicare or Medicaid refuse to pay the bill, the patient cannot be charged by the hospital. Earlier this year, the New Jersey Hospital Association opposed the bill, stating that the statistics gathered don't accurately report the number of mistakes made by hospitals, which could then lead to an increase in malpractice suits. In an effort to reduce the number of malpractice suits, health care workers are able to report hospital errors anonymously.

Full post as published by Traumatic Brain Injury Law Blog on September 08, 2009 (boomark / email).