Negligence can be referred to as the action of failing to exercise reasonable care as compared to a prudent person’s use in a similar circumstance. According to tort law, negligence is associated with harm which can endanger other people due to carelessness. On the other hand, malpractice is a kind of neglect often referred to as “professional negligence’’. Professional negligence happens when a licensed expert like a lawyer, doctor or accountant fails to offer service according to the set standards by a governing body in that particular practice. Often, malpractice causes harm since the experts do no not follow the necessary guidelines as required in their line of duty. Specifically, this paper focuses on discussing some of the negligence and malpractice in healthcare. It will vividly look at several cases regarding carelessness, non-adherence to set standards and harm caused to the patients and other involved parties in the health care industry.
Standard of Care
Usually, the standards of care are developed by organizational procedures, policies as well as other regulatory bodies. At some point the opposing councils review the policies and modalities to ascertain whether they meet the required standards. In the spirit of ensuring better standards of care and reduced levels of negligence, the nursing profession should undertake periodic reviews of their policies and procedures to avert the increasing numbers of negligence and malpractice witnessed over the past years. Policies and procedures are paramount in defining the minimum level of services expected of medical staff (Baicker, & Chandra, 2005). The management should avail copies of these policies and procedures to every individual employee at all times. And, to make this more practical, staff members who are affected must be involved in drafting policies and procedures to avoid reoccurrence.
Elements of Health Care Malpractice
There are several reported cases of healthcare malpractice but this study will highlight and discuss major elements of malpractice noticeable in hospitals. The factors as discussed below:
Duty
Usually, duty means a lot to the patients. Thus, organizations should ensure to define precisely responsibility in their policies and procedures. For instance, satisfactory work can be done in providing a safe environment rather than just trying to avert harm. This implies that nurses can do better in their duty to offer satisfactory work rather causing harm as a result of their faults. The nursing assignment should involve interpretation and adherence to orders from the physicians, that is, a function assumed must be executed properly. For instance, when intubating, perseverance may be right. Any delay to attend patients can result in harm which could be better avoided by being careful and following correct procedures.
Breach of Duty
Breach of duty occurs when a nurse who is responsible for taking care of a patient fails to do so. A good example of this scenario is when a nurse fails to offer a safe environment to a patient by forgetting to move him or her to a better position in bed. Often this causes personal harm to patients, and it is against the set rules of the nursing practice.
Damages
Damages come as a result of a breach of law. Like a case where a patient falls off the bed and injures one part of his or her body. Such cases are prevalent in hospitals and they happen due to the carelessness of nurses whose responsibility is to take good care of their patients (Croke, 2003). As matter of fact, before entering any career, there are set requirements to ensure that one bears responsibility in case of breach of set laws. As for the nursing faculty, scholars are made aware of the conditions and terms of their job description. Thus, it requires one to be compassionate and ready to take good care of patients.
Guidelines to Complying with Regulatory Laws
Stopping negligence and malpractice in the healthcare require adherence to regulatory laws which governs the practice. Always an organization should create awareness to its staff on matters regarding to regulatory requirements. These laws are drafted to ensure that employees act with reasonable prudence that cannot harm other people due to carelessness (Phillips et al., 2004). Firstly an organization should make sure that it is fully registered under relevant authorities that oversee their operations.
Impacts of Illegal Acts in the Health Care
Undertaking illegal procedures can lead to the closure of a hospital, fine, and imprisonment of those culpable. The law prohibits any acts by the health practitioners that may endanger patients’ lives. The constitution explicitly elaborates on policies and procedures to be followed before a health organization is permitted to conduct its services. This is the reason why hospitals need to meet certain requirements including licensing which authorizes them to perform certain procedures. It is unwise not to go against the law and measures are in place to reduce cases of those operating outside the standards in health care.
The Importance of Complying with Health Care Regulations
Meeting the health care management protocols benefits the organization, staff as well as patients. Firstly, it does help to reduce instances of carelessness that may result in harm to patients. Following health care regulations does ensure that experts execute the duties in the best interests of the patients. Adhering to these rules can help relieve the company the burden of reported lawsuits against their worker's misconducts. Therefore, organizations should ensure to comply with regulatory laws so as to get accredited to operate.
Finally, it is evident that negligence is the act of carelessness by the health staff members resulting in harm to the patients. Malpractice is situation whereby, medical staffs fail to follow set standards when performing their duties. Nurses should adhere to the health care regulations so as to avoid causing unintentional harm to the patients. To curb this, organizations are required to make policies and procedures that should be followed when executing duties.
References
Baicker, K., & Chandra, A. (2005, January). The effect of malpractice liability on the delivery of health care. In Forum for Health Economics & Policy (Vol. 8, No. 1).
Croke, E. M. (2003). Nurses, Negligence, and Malpractice: An analysis based on more than 250 cases against nurses. AJN The American Journal of Nursing, 103(9), 54-63.
Phillips, R. L., Bartholomew, L. A., Dovey, S. M., Fryer, G. E., Miyoshi, T. J., & Green, L. A. (2004). Learning from malpractice claims about negligent, adverse events in primary care in the United States. Quality and Safety in Health Care, 13(2), 121-126.
