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Chapter 2 |
Chapter 3 |
Chapter 4 |
Chapter 5
Chapter 6 |
Chapter 7 |
Chapter 8 |
Post test |
References
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How Big is the Problem?
Death from medical errors annually is said to exceed those from motor vehicle accidents, breast cancer, or Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS).[2] Medication errors alone have been assessed at over $2 billion dollars cost to the healthcare system with adverse drug events (ADE) accounting for close to 7000 deaths in the US.[3] Each preventable ADE costs a facility approximately $4700. This calculates to around $2.8 million dollars per year for a 700-bed hospital. Generalizing that to a national level will reach into the billions of dollars. The IOM report indicates a 6% potential increase for an adverse event occurrence with each additional hospital day of stay.[4]