The unfortunate reality of our healthcare system is that hospitals designed to help patients often end up causing them even more pain. Each year, preventable medical mistakes contribute to nearly 190,000 deaths and more than 6 million injuries. Among the most common mistakes are procedures performed on the wrong body part, hospital-acquired infections, and medication …
White House Takes Action to Reduce Medical Mistakes
For millions of patients and their families, the current health care system is woefully inadequate. Patients that rely on hospitals to treat them in their time of need are often further victimized by medical errors, injuries, and complications that are preventable. Some hospitals have attempted to improve patient care by adopting new safety strategies such …
Medical Errors Often Undetected
After more than a decade of efforts to improve the quality of patient care in our nation’s hospitals, the problem continues to persist. And the problem may be even bigger than we realize. A study in this month’s journal Health Affairs found that the number of adverse events occurring in hospitals may be 10 times larger than …
High-Risk Medical Devices Sold Without Proof of Safety
The safety of certain medical devices, such as pacemakers and heart valves, is under serious scrutiny. These high-risk devices may lead to serious injury or death in patients, and government investigators found that lax review by the Food and Drug Administration is putting the publics health even more at risk. The Government Accountability Office recently …
Heartburn Drug Warning
Every day, millions of Americans suffer from acid reflux and the troublesome symptoms it brings, including frequent heartburn, chest pain, and coughing. Many of them turn to acid-suppressing drugs like Prilosec and Prevacid for relief. But a new safety warning by the FDA is causing doctors to re-evaluate the risks and benefits of these popular …
Silence among Health-Care Workers Puts Patients at Risk
It is well-established that preventable medical errors are far too common and prove fatal to hundreds of thousands of patients each year. Although it is encouraging that some hospitals have taken preventative steps such as patient checklists or automated medication dispensing systems, a new study shows that poor communication among nurses still contributes to a …
Drug Makers Disclose Payments to Doctors
It is routine practice for drug developers to pay doctors hundreds of millions of dollars a year to “educate” their fellow physicians about a company drug, in the hopes that they will consider prescribing the drug to patients. These “pill-pushing” payouts are extremely controversial. Critics of the pharmaceutical industry say the payments are nothing more …
Patients Suffer When Doctors Fail to Communicate
Emergency room visits can be traumatic for patients, especially young and senior citizen patients that contribute to more than 120 million emergency room visits each year. But even after patients leave the ER, their health may still be in jeopardy. Poor communication between emergency room physicians and primary care physicians can seriously undermine effective care. …
New Birth Defect Warning for Topamax
Federal drug regulators have issued a disturbing new warning for women who are pregnant or plan to become pregnant. Research shows that the popular migraine medication Topamax seriously raises the risk of birth defects such as a cleft lip or cleft palate, especially when taken during the first trimester of pregnancy. New drug registry data …
Prescription Painkillers Increase Risk of Birth Defects
A new study shows that taking prescription painkillers shortly before or early in a woman’s pregnancy can be incredibly risky. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) warn that certain opioid pain relievers, including Vicodin, OxyContin and Tylenol-3, increase the risk of several major birth defects. This particular class of medications more than doubles …
Many Dementia Patient Hospitalizations Could be Avoided
Residents suffering from advanced dementia are among the most vulnerable patients in nursing homes. These elderly patients are often bed-bound, unable to speak more than a few words, and prone to confusion or fear. Although it is less traumatic for dementia patients to remain in the nursing home, a recent New York Times blog points …
Thanksgiving Warning: Deep Fried Turkeys Lead to Burn Injuries
Deep frying a turkey on Thanksgiving has become a popular trend, leading to delicious yet potentially dangerous results. Deep fried turkeys carry a greater fire risk than their traditional baked counterparts, and additional safety steps should be taken to ensure a safe and enjoyable holiday. Every Thanksgiving results in reports of house fires caused by …
Attorney Bill Pintas Gets a Taste of the Las Vegas “Death Ray”
Our very own Chicago personal injury attorney, Bill Pintas, experienced the hotter side of Las Vegas (quite literally) while staying at the Vdara Hotel in Las Vegas. Attorney Pintas was actually looking to cool down at the hotel pool when he experienced this heated phenomenon. As he laid back in a chair he was suddenly …
Warnings About ASR Hip Replacement Failure
The New York Times recently reported that DePuy Orthopaedics, a unit of Johnson & Johnson, has warned doctors that an artificial hip implant known as the ASR has a high early failure rate in some patients. The warning comes after more than two years of reports of implant failures in patients after only a few …
Scrutiny Lacking for Long-Term Care Hospitals?
The New York Times recently published an article on the lack of scrutiny long-term healthcare hospitals face over their standards of care. According to the report, Medicare has never closely examined the care provided in these facilities, which are largely run by for-profit companies and have no doctors on staff. Many are “hospitals within hospitals”€, …
FDA Warnings against Simultaneous Use of Plavix and Prilosec or Nexium
Millions of Americans take the blood thinner Plavix to reduce their risk of blood clots, which may lead to heart attack or stroke. Since Plavix can lead to an upset stomach, doctors often prescribe Prilosec and Nexium to treat this symptom. However, the FDA recently issued warnings that these medications may decrease the anti-clotting benefits …
Accutane and Increased Risk of Inflammatory Bowel Disease
In June of this year, Roche Holding quietly pulled the drug Accutane from the market. Accutane is prescribed to treat moderate to severe cases of acne. The drug has had an extensive history of leading to adverse effects since its approval in 1982, such as suicidal behavior and birth defects. The removal of the drug …
Federal Investigation into Marketing Practices of Depakote
The Chicago Tribune recently reported that Abbott Laboratories is under investigation for their sale and marketing practices of Depakote. Depakote is prescribed primarily to treat bipolar disorder. In certain cases, it is also used to treat major depressive disorder, epilepsy, chronic pain associated with neuropathy, and migraine headaches. The federal probe was initiated to find …
Zicam Shareholder Lawsuit
On Thursday of last week, a federal appeals court unanimously voted to reinstate a shareholder lawsuit against Matrixx Initiatives, the makers of the popular cold remedy Zicam. The lawsuit claims that the shareholders of the company did not disclose information that the drug was potentially harmful to the public and instead issued incorrect and misleading …
Taking Aranesp Increases Your Risk of Suffering a Stroke
A new study published last week pointed to an increased risk of stroke for patients taking the medication Aranesp. Aranesp is part of a class of drugs known as erythropoiesis-stimulating agents (ESAs), which stimulate the body to produce more red blood cells. ESAs are primarily used to treat anemia in patients with chronic kidney failure, …