A new report by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare
(AIHW) shows that claims for harm or loss alleged to have resulted
from an error or negligence in a medical or surgical procedure made
up over 34% (2,361 claims) of all medical indemnity claims in the
public sector in 2005-06.
The report, Medical indemnity national data collection
public sector 2005-06, examined the 6,922 claims that were
active during the year, and found that 19.8% (1,372 claims) related
to diagnosis issues, such as a failure to correctly diagnose a
problem or a misdiagnosis.
Treatment issues, such as delayed treatment, failure to provide
treatment, and complications arising from treatment were the
reasons for 13.7% (946 claims) of medical indemnity claims.
'Examples include failure to perform a procedure, having the
wrong procedure performed, having a procedure performed on the
wrong part of the body, post-operative complications and failure of
procedure,' said Ms Jenny Hargreaves, Senior Executive of the
AIHW's Economics and Health Services Group.
Settlement through court decisions represented 4% of finalised
claims, with most claims being settled through dispute resolution
or other processes.
The majority (83.3%) of claims closed in the 2005-06 financial
year had a total claim size of less than $100,000 including 458
claims where no payment was made. Just under 4% of claims were
settled for payments in excess of $500,000.
During this period 4,802 claims involved adults, 687 related to
babies, and children were the subject of 520 medical indemnity
claims.
'It is important to note that the report represents a profile of
national public sector medical indemnity claims data only - fault
or negligence on the part of the health care provider is not
necessarily established,' Ms Hargreaves said.
The report includes 89% of all claims made in the public sector,
which is an increase of 4% in completeness from the previous
report, and is the first in this series to include information
about three consecutive financial years of claims data.
It covers incidents that gave rise to medical indemnity claims,
the medical specialties involved in those claims, the nature of
injury, and the size of the claims and other aspects of medical
indemnity claims in the public sector.
29 August 2007
Further information: Ms Jenny Hargreaves, AIHW,
tel. 02 6244 1121 or mob. 0407 012 520
For media copies of the report: Publications
Officer, AIHW, tel. 61 2 6244 1032.
Availability: Check the AIHW Publications
Catalogue for availability of Medical indemnity
national data collection public sector 2005-06.