Doctor-Patient Bond Frays After Medical Mistake

WEDNESDAY, Oct. 24 (HealthDay News) -- Serious medical errors don't just affect the health of the patient, they can quickly destroy the patient's relationship with his or her doctor, too, experts say.

Too often, a health care mistake causes shame and fear in the physician responsible, leading to stilted, unsatisfying conversations with -- or avoidance of -- the affected patient, say the authors of an article in the Oct. 25 New England Journal of Medicine.

All of this can quickly move patient and doctor into an adversarial or litigious position.

But that's not always necessary, said one of the article's co-authors.

text continues below

"Trust is an enormously important part of medicine -- if people aren't straight with you, you do not trust them," said Dr. Tom DelBanco, a professor of general medicine and primary care at Harvard Medical School.

"So, being upfront and honest, indicating that you want to do something about what happened, makes all the difference in the world," said Delbanco, who co-wrote the article with Harvard colleague Dr. Sigall Bell.

In many cases, doctors who frankly admitted their mistake and told patients how they would safeguard against future errors avoided litigation by doing so, Delbanco said. Those doctors also maintained strong, long-lasting bonds with the patient and the patient's family.

According to Delbanco, several patients interviewed for the article (and a related film) said that, " 'We don't expect you to be perfect, everybody makes mistakes. We just want you to be honest when it happens. We can deal with that.' "

In fact, "There are now some malpractice [insurance] companies that teach doctors to be honest and open," Delbanco noted. "There is slowly growing evidence that it may actually prevent lawsuits."

Medical errors have gotten a lot more attention recently, ever since the U.S. Institute of Medicine issued its 1999 report, To Err is Human. That report estimated that the deaths of more than 100,000 Americans each year are tied to some form of medical mistake.