A national patient safety council should be set up to help reduce medical accidents nationwide, a former health official suggested.
Pham Duc Muc, former deputy head of the Medical Examination and Treatment Department under the Ministry of Health, told Tuoi Tre that such a council will help improve safety for patients and prevent medical accidents during treatment.
Many countries including the US, the UK and Australia have established such a council. In Asia, Malaysia has set up one, Muc said.
Considering patient safety as a public health issue, these countries publicize the number of medical malpractice cases at each hospital, and suggest measures to improve treatment quality and to reduce such cases year after year. According to international statistics, 30 percent of medical accidents directly resulted from malpractice of the medical service providers. In the US, nosocomial infections account for 5 percent of total infections, affecting about 1.7 million people per year. The infection causes the hospitalization period of patients to be 17.5 days longer, thereby increasing medical treatment cost. Muc also answered some questions from Tuoi Tre.Q: Upon establishment, what will the national council for patient safety do to help reduce medical accidents? The Council will help the heath sector to make a list of medical accidents which all hospitals must report to the Ministry of Health when such accidents occur. At the same time, the Council will help build a process to deal with such accidents. Through the council, the health sector will have statistics of medical accidents and patients involved per year.Q: What kind of unsafe condition often occurs at hospitals? This is in injections. A safe injection is required to meet as many as 14 criteria. If any of these criteria is violated, then the injection is seen as unsafe.