Are You Confident in the Patient Safety at Your Local Hospital?

It is a common misconception among patients in the United States that their local hospitals are safe, healthy places where they can confidently receive high quality medical care in a sterile environment. Sadly, this is not always the case, and people in many communities across the U.S. will be shocked to learn the ugly truth.  In fact, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services estimates that approximately 1.4 million people are seriously harmed during a hospital stay, and roughly 180,000 people die every year from hospital caused accidents, mistakes and infections.  Putting blind faith in a community hospital is a misconception that most of us cannot afford.

How to Find Out Your Hospital Rating

When a company called Hospital Safety Score assigned grades to over 2600 American hospitals, over half of them received scores of "C" or lower, when they were assigned the letter grades A, B, C, D and F.

The scores were based on a number of important factors including things as simple as hand washing and correct antibiotic use to more serious issues such as the number of times an object was left inside a patient during surgery and how often a patient was accidentally cut during their treatment.

To find out how the hospitals in your area were rated, look them up on this free website:

http://hospitalsafetyscore.org

If you are not satisfied with the scores of the hospital nearest you, you may discover that there are other hospitals in your county that scored much higher.  If you want to compare two hospitals on the basis of death rates from heart attacks and pneumonia, as well as similar issues, you can do so on this U.S. government website:

http://hospitalcompare.hhs.gov

This website is operated by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and is also free.

Other Ways to Protect Yourself During a Hospital Stay

Even if your local hospital rating is very high, you will still want to take charge of your medical care as much as you possibly can.  Here are some steps you can take to improve your care:

Be nice to the medical staff.  It does make a difference.

Wash your own hands and ask your visitors and the medical staff to wash theirs, too.

Keep a close eye on your wounds, stitches and bandages.  Report any bleeding, oozing, dirty bandages, loose bandages or other problems to the hospital staff as soon as possible.

Take all the antibiotics that you are given.

Follow all pre-op and post-op instructions carefully.

Remember:  You are not the only person in the hospital.  You are surrounded by people with infectious diseases. You need to do everything you can to protect yourself during and after your hospital stay.  Don't turn complete responsibility for your health over to someone else, even if that someone else is a hospital staff member.  Speak up if you have concerns and questions.  It could save your life.

You are reading from the blog:  http://lies-and-liars.blogspot.com

Photo of hospital courtesy of www.morguefile.com

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