Medical Malpractice In Nursing

Age. One of life’s aspects that no one has ever been able to reverse. As time moves forward, so does age. People do as much as they can to not look nor act their age but one day it happens. They realize that they are no longer twenty-five but eighty-five. They begin to depend more on their family and healthcare providers to keep them moving. Unfortunately, regardless of how much faith one may have in the healthcare system nothing is perfect. As an elder one may decide to enter a senior citizen long term care housing or may even be fortunate enough to hire a home healthcare nurse with the hopes that these healthcare providers will do as their title states and provide healthcare, exquisite healthcare. One unfortunate day comes when either themselves …show more content…
Because a single facility may encompass such an extensive group of people, it is not unusual for a patient to fail to realize that healthcare professionals include a spectrum that extend lengths pass just the doctor. From the transcriber recording the physicians notes to the translator assisting patients in communicating with the surrounding staff, almost everyone within such facility is considered a healthcare professional and can in fact induce harm to the patient. The issue with this tends to be whether or not the harm was in some ways intentional. On a daily basis these specialists work up to a twelve-hour shift, providing the most diligent care they can to a patient, or at least they think. From cleaning wounds, to prescribing medications, they do it all with the expectation being they are doing it with the patient’s optimal overall health in mind. With this in mind people tend forget that “No setting is hazard-free, no medical specialty is immune, and patients are at risk no matter what their age, sex, and state of health.” (Inelmen, 16) Medical error in some terms can be looked upon as inevitable because no person, no matter what their occupational title is, can be perfect. Unfortunately, patients who need the care the most i.e., the critically afflicted, ones needing numerous surgical procedures, and even those who are required to stay in a caregiving facility for extended amounts of time, are more likely to be affected by medical error. With a soaring amount of these patients that are previously noted as needing the care the most being baby boomers, it would be valid to deduce that medical errors or malpractice is frequently seen in the geriatric field. The despairing truth is patients are not