Don't Make Your Surgeon Operate You on this Date!

Healthcare is one of the concerns of people from all around the world to engage in everything life has to offer.

One of the procedures concerning healthcare is surgeries. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), surgical care has been an essential component of healthcare worldwide for over a century. The organization furthers in their article that it is important because the incidence of traumatic injuries, cardiovascular diseases, and cancers continue to rise, surgical treatment in health care will continue to grow.

Being operated on aims for treatment of an injury however, although surgeons have years of education backing them up, medical malpractice that can cause fatal effects can still occur.

A study from the United States discovers the linkage of the surgeon's birthday to higher rates of medical malpractice.

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The Connection

Study: Medical Malpractice Rate Higher, During the Surgeon's Birthday

(Photo : Go Nakamura)
Medical staff members prepare to perform a percutaneous tracheostomy procedure on a patient in the COVID-19 intensive care unit (ICU) during Thanksgiving at the United Memorial Medical Center on November 26, 2020 in Houston, Texas. According to reports, Texas has reached over 1,220,000 cases, including over 21,500 deaths.

The US study notes in Medical Xpress that the theory that surrounds this phenomenon is that surgeons might be more likely to be distracted or in a hurry to finish the important procedures o their special day which is why patient outcomes may be different on those days.

To test the theory, The Herald reports that the researchers compared about 980,000 common procedures administered by about 48,000 surgeons from the hospitals in the United States between 2011-2014.

Eureka Alert adds that among the mentioned procedures, 2,064 were performed during the surgeon's birthday. Medical Xpress notes that the information was linked to factors such as the birthday of the surgeons, patient's age, the severity of illness, surgeon's specialty, and the number of hospital staffing.

The Figures

Published in the British Medical Journal, the study notes in Medical Xpress that patients who undergo surgery on the surgeon's birthday experience higher mortality, compared to patients who undergo surgery on other days of the year.

Eureka Alert adds that the percentage of mortality rates between surgery on the surgeon's birthday and surgery on an ordinary day is 6.9% and 5.6% respectively.

Moreover, The Herald also mentions a Scottish study that demonstrates people who are admitted to hospitals as an emergency during public holidays experience a 27% higher rate of medical malpractice.

The researchers explain in Medical Xpress that factors are affecting the surgeon's performance during the special day such as evening plans. They also added that conversations with the medical staff and birthday greeting on their phone during surgeries may be distracting, resulting in medical errors.

Conclusion of the study

The Herald adds that the researchers emphasized the birthdays are substantial and are also comparable to other events like holidays. Eureka Alert furthers that these factors affect the quality of care the patients receive.

However, the researchers emphasize in Medical Xpress that their study is observational and will not be able to establish the cause. Furthermore, the researchers say that they were not able to examine the cause of death or exclude the impact of other unmeasured factors.

Given this study, maybe it is smarter to ask your physician for his or her comfortable time in doing your surgeries to prevent medical malpractice and mortality. Remember that your healthcare should always the top priority of your surgeon and not any other activities.

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