Transcript

Study into surgery deaths released

O'Donnell, Mick

2005

Overview

KERRY O'BRIEN: Since an Australian Government study a decade ago estimated 18,000 people a year died from adverse events in hospitals, there's been pressure to expose the flaws in the systems and fix them. The concern has led to one Western Australian surgeon initiating an audit into his own profession. The findings, released today, suggest there are preventable deaths happening which will only be stopped if surgeons review their work openly. Some are willing to own up to their errors in the operating theatre but only if their names are withheld. This has prompted calls for the names of doctors who make mistakes to be made public. Others say this will only make surgeons scapegoats for a fundamentally flawed hospital system. Mick O'Donnell reports. [MICK O'DONNELL]: Three years ago, cases like these led surgeons James Aitken to begin a pioneering study in Western Australia, the first state to attempt to audit every death related to surgery. MICK O'DONNELL: The need for surgeons to be more open about their successes and failures is starkly evident in a separate audit of deaths in trauma surgery at Liverpool Hospital in Sydney. The results, to be released tomorrow, suggest 21 per cent of trauma deaths between 96 and 2003 were potentially avoidable. It does sound shocking?

• Publisher: Australian Broadcasting Corporation
• Subject: Aitken, James / Carey-Hazell, Karen / O Donnell, Mick / Oakley, Justin / Sugrue, Michael