The People We Call Doctors

Why would doctors harm their patients? Why do we continue to just stand in the background watching, refusing to speak up? This is what people do every day while doctors are harming and killing their patients. Doctors are like hungry lions, vicious and cold-blooded, just waiting for the money to roll in like an oncoming storm. There are giraffes in the background baffled about what they should do. They should speak up. They should tell someone what these lions are doing. Doctors should not get away with what they are doing to their patients. We should not just be standing around waiting to do something. We should speak up about the “loving” and “caring” people we call doctors; a large percentage of people claim that they have experienced medical errors.  How many of these flaws have gone unreported and how do you know if you have had a medical error?

            There are many types of medical errors: surgical errors, medication errors, misdiagnosis, and equipment and lab reports. Surgical errors are when a mistake is made during any type of surgery whether it is cosmetic or medical. Surgical errors can be caused by infection, medical instruments left in the body after surgery, and other serious injuries caused by surgery. Medication errors are any error caused by medicine. Medication errors can be caused by a mix-up in medicines or a problem reading what the doctor wrote for the patient to have. Misdiagnosis is when a doctor diagnoses the patient for the wrong symptoms. Equipment and lab reports can be the one thing that can save or harm a patient and if you misinterpret these findings or if something’s wrong with the equipment, that can be the end of the patient‘s life.   Do you know how many people die each year from these errors? Over 225,000 people die from these errors every year making it the number 3 killer in America. (Medical Errors, The FDA, and Problems With Prescription Drugs) That is a really sad fact to face.

            People always think that doctors are the one that can cure whatever they come in with. When in reality, they can make it ten times worse. According to the article The Emily Jerry Foundation, founded by Chris Jerry, a loving father, in memory of his daughter Emily Jerry who died of medical errors. At the time of her death she was only two years old. She was diagnosed with a yolk sac tumor in her abdomen when she was a year and a half old. This is when her chemotherapy started. She was always so bright and happy and before her chemotherapy was even over, her tumor completely disappeared! The doctors wanted to do a last round of chemotherapy, just to make sure that there were no more traces of cancer left in her body. Two days after her birthday on February 26, 2006 was her last chemotherapy treatment. This is when everything started to go wrong. She woke up from her nap feeling really groggy and complaining that her head hurt which was really unnatural for her, Chris Jerry claimed. Afterwards she started profusely vomiting and then she went completely limp. They put her on life support that night and everybody prayed that everything was going to be alright. The next morning she was found brain dead on life support. All of this was caused by an overdose of sodium chloride in her chemotherapy IV bag because the nurse filled a bag with concentrated sodium chloride solution of 23.4% instead of the less than one percent that she was supposed to get. The funny thing about this was that the nurses at that hospital did not even have any training.

            There is good news about this subject though; it can be prevented. According to SurgicalFire.Org, medical errors can be prevented with 20 helpful tips. SurgicalFire states that if you have any questions, ask them to make sure that your doctor knows what they are doing and that you are aware of what is going on as well. They also state that if you have any questions on the medication that your doctor prescribes, ask. You never know if they gave you the right or wrong kind of medication and to make sure that you don’t accidentally overdose. It is also important to tell the doctor if you have any allergies so they will not give you any kind of medication that is of any harm to you. A study by the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Allied Health Sciences states that 88 percent of medicine errors are caused by the wrong drug or a drug overdose. (Preventing Medical Errors) SurgicalFire also states that if you have any test results, to ask for them. Do not assume that no news, is good news. Everybody has a question about the medical world and it is time for you to ask yours.

            Medical errors can be very frustrating but as long as you know what they are they can be spotted a lot faster. You do not want to be like one of those families who does not know what killed their beloved family member or one of those people who has experienced a medical errors and has let it gone on without anybody noticing. Emily’s family was really sad when she passed away but at least they got to the bottom of it and found the reason why she died.  You want to be like those people who asked their doctor what was wrong with them and the people that knew that the doctors knew what they were doing. Do not be one of those 225,00 people that die every year; be one of those people who stands up to their doctor and says what the doctor’s doing is wrong. Do not be part of the sad statistics; be one of the people that sticks around long enough to create the statistics.