Comments on: Physician, (apologize and) heal thyself

By: sumac

sumac — Thu, 20 Mar 2014 16:57:30 +0000

In reply to Joe Flower. Thank you very much, Joe. It's so hard for us puny humans to think that the coverup is worse than the crime.

By: sumac

sumac — Thu, 20 Mar 2014 16:55:41 +0000

The last one amazes me. Apology without admission? How does that work?

“I am so sorry that you had to have a second surgery to remove a half-eaten energy bar from your abdominal cavity. I have no idea how that happened. On the bright side, that’s a great brand of energy bar, and the ingredients are top-notch. It’s the only kind I eat, because we surgeons have to be on top of our game at all times. We all regret what happened, however it happened. We’ll be looking into it! So please accept our apologies for this totally mysterious occurrence.”

By: Anita

Anita — Thu, 20 Mar 2014 04:46:17 +0000

The truth will set you free… or at least be less expensive.

By: snarly

snarly — Wed, 19 Mar 2014 23:23:11 +0000

In reply to Joe Flower. Thanks for posting, Joe! Great to have confirmation from an expert that apologies really DO have an important role in medicine.

By: Joe Flower

Joe Flower — Wed, 19 Mar 2014 23:01:26 +0000

Saying you’re sorry is actually been the subject of big discussion in the malpractice and medical risk field for something like the last decade. And the Chief Risk Officer is wrong: actually admitting that there was a problem and owning up to what you did to cause it does not increase your legal and financial exposure, it decreases it. Vanderbilt University was one of the pioneers. They show that their overall malpractice costs (insurance, claims, legal costs) dropped dramatically, by something like half, when when they adopted a new policy: acknowledge the problem, investigate to see what caused it, then meet with the patient or family and offer an apology, a clear description of what happened, and a cash settlement.

This works far better than the classic deny, clam up, and defend tactics. Johns Hopkins is actually put out a video series on how to apologize. I have a chapter on this in my book: Healthcare Beyond Reform: Doing It Right for Half the Cost.