Handling Medical Errors

Handling Medical Errors is about the mistakes that doctors make when working on a patient and how they should be handled. Some say that a thorough apology is enough while others say that it isn’t and they should be punished. This article connects to the poem “The Printer’s Error” by Aaron Fogel. This poem talks about we as people trying to correct every mistake we make. The author says that mistakes and errors are apart of divine creation and who we are. If it’s understood that no one is perfect, why must we proofread and correct before we allow everyone else to see? My question is at what point should we be held accountable for our errors. Doctors are humans and humans are not perfect, so why should we punish them for errors? A doctor is practicing medicine and when you are practicing anything there is always the possibility of a slip up. We have such a huge issue with a doctor making a mistake because we trust that they know what they’re doing and we trust that we will wake up from a surgery. The reality of the situation is what kind of rapport has this person built with you, so that you trust them with your life? This connects to me because I do not think that I would be okay with a doctor making a medical error while operating on me. I never fully trust what a doctor says, and I often research things on my own before taking a word for it, that includes prescribed medications. I always check side effects, pros, cons, before I just introduce these things to my body. This connects to East Texas because we have doctors and patients here who would be afraid of being the victim of a medical error.