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13.10.04, 01:12
HEALTH CARE - AMERICA'S LEADING CAUSE OF DEATH
In 1999, the Institute of Medicine released a groundbreaking report on a
largely unrecognized affliction amongst hospital patients: Doctors. The study
estimated that between 44,000 and 98,000 hospitalized Americans die every
year as a result of errors made by treating physicians--including improper
drug administration, surgery conducted on the wrong part of the body, and
even mistaken patient identities. Addressing the current state of medical
treatment, the investigators wrote: "The status quo is not acceptable and
cannot be tolerated anymore."
They had no idea.
It turns out that the study's estimate of yearly casualties from medical
errors--numbers already higher than those for annual deaths from car
accidents, breast cancer, or AIDS--may only be the tip of iceberg. A report
last year from the non-profit Nutrition Institute of America estimated that
conventional medicine in fact kills over 780,000 Americans per year. That
makes healthcare the #1 cause of death in our country.
How do doctors' errors add up to such staggering numbers? One major factor is
misuse of drugs, including cases where meds are given in the wrong amounts,
at the wrong times, or in lethal combination with each other. One study in
2002 found that hospitals average 40 drug-dosing errors per day. The
Nutrition Institute study estimates annual deaths from these mix-ups at
106,000. Another 88,000 fatalities are thought to be caused by treatment-
resistant bacteria that result from the over-prescription of antibiotics,
another common form of drug misuse.
Surgery is also an area where mistakes regularly kill. To begin with, the
Nutrition Institute says, about 17% of surgical procedures are unnecessary,
which translates to 7.5 million Americans going under the knife without good
reason, and over 37,000 of such patients dying from complications. One
Spanish study pegged the percentage of unnecessary surgeries even higher