Navy Jet Fighter Crash - - Did the Government Fix the Problem?

Dean Swartz — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 11:49:00 GMT

The crash of a Navy FA-18 jet fighter on into an apartment building in Virginia on Friday (April 6) is a real tragedy. (Reuters News Service - http://news.yahoo.com/navy-jet-crashes-virginia-apartments-3-unaccounted-023446677.html) It would be even more so if the cause was the same as the crash that killed a young woman near PAX River Maryland when the pilots lost control of their FA-18 shortly after takeoff because they were unaware that the "flight control system" failed to detect a fault when the pilots did their "pre-flight" check. Swartz & Reed represented the widow of the victim in that case. We discovered that when the pilot hits the "flight control reset button" to run a second check of the flight control system is found to have a "fault," the second check simply skips over the first fault without indicating that it still exists. The pilots think they are "green to go" when in fact, the computer just ignores the first fault. The result was the death of a young woman when the pilots had to eject from their uncontrollable FA-18 and it crashed into her truck as she drove to work. Let's hope that a defective "flight control system" computer check wasn't the cause of this latest tragedy.

Healthier Healthcare

Barry Reed — Tue, 13 Mar 2012 13:03:00 GMT

HEALTIER HEALTHCARE

One of a series of notes that can help patients avoid health care related harm and injuries to patients. Advanced Directive and Health Care Proxy.

AARP HOSPITAL STAY CHECKLIST

The March 1, 2012 AARP Bulletin The American Association of Retired Persons [AARP] provides a list of important tips for any person who is admitted to a hospital. The article was subtitled "Advice on how to prepare and be a proactive patient." Briefly, it's not enough to just show up in the hospital's admitting office and presume that an automatic pilot will lead you to a successful stay and discharge from the hospital. You make plans before setting out for a vacation, while most hospital admissions are no vacation, planning for the hospitalization, treatment or doctor's visit is at least as important. A part of the AARP list appears below:

1. Patients should personalize their contacts with the hospital staff you encounter as a patient. The author believes that the personalized relationships are more likely to help reduce the number of mistakes like drug dosages or incorrect medications, which can happen during your hospital admission as a patient. Some of the mistakes can result in serious patient harm, injury or death. The AARP list encourages the patient to know their caregivers by name including the nurses and aides as well as the names of the doctors and therapists. Name familiarity encourages personal human relationships that are more likely to assure quality care and avoids becoming nameless and forgotten.

2. The patient's knowledge of their own medications and the medication schedules. AARP recommends that the patient keep a notebook within reach, which includes the names, times of administration and purposes for all the medication.

3. AARP's list also emphasizes the importance of the cleanliness of your hospital room. Patient charts, furniture surfaces and bathrooms can be the breeding ground for harmful bacteria and viruses. The use of hand sanitizers by patients is encouraged because patients handle objects and materials that are handled by other persons. The objects touched surfaces can become temporary homes for viruses and bacteria. Personal hygiene cannot be over-emphasized. A more fundamental kind of cleanliness, which most of us learned in kindergarten, involves hand washing. Most hospital acquired, or nosocomial infections, [infections brought into the hospital by someone other than the patient] are passed from other patient's infections, hospital visitors, and hospital staff. The spread of many of these infections could be prevented by hand washing. I n case you think this is a trivial matter, see the American Hospital Association data below:

Statistical brief on hospital-acquired infections

Posted on August 31, 2010 by The AHA Resource Center

A new AHRQ statistical briefing examines hospital-acquired infections based on an analysis of 2007 data from the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project [HCUP]. Some quick highlights from the report indicate:

Over 42,000 adult patients acquired infections during their hospital stay in 2007.
Hospital patients with infections due to medical care had an average length of stay 19.2 days longer than patients without infections.
A patient with one of these infections cost nearly $43,000 more to treat than non-infected patients
The adult infection rate was 2.03 per 1000 hospital stays for medical and surgical discharges in 2007, an improvement from a 2.30 rate in 2004 and 2005.
The highest infection rate [2.58 per 1000] occurred in the 45-64 year age group, while the highest volume of patients [nearly 19,000] were in the age 65 and over range.
Septicemia was the most common diagnosis for a hospital stay with a healthcare acquired infection.

Source: Lucado J and others. Adult hospital stays with infections due to medical care, 2007. HCUP Statistical Brief [Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project/Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality] #94, Aug. 2010.

References: http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMra1108296#t=references

Persons contacted in BWH: Observers note adherence by type of staff (e.g., physician/physician assistant, nurse, environmental services staff, patient transporter, emergency medical services personnel http://www.innovations.ahrq.gov/content.aspx?id=3071

http://www.aarp.org/health/doctors-hospitals/info-03-2012/patient-checklist-for-hospital-stay.2.html

Welcome to our Military Medical Malpractice Blog.

Swart & Reed — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 17:56:00 GMT

Our lawyers are pleased to announce the launch of our military medical malpractice blog.

Recent Blog Posts

Navy Jet Fighter Crash - - Did the Government Fix the Problem?

Healthier Healthcare

Statistical brief on hospital-acquired infections

Welcome to our Military Medical Malpractice Blog.