Medical error: Foundation demands emergency aid for victims of treatment errors

Diseases discovered too late, wrong medication or incorrect cuts during operations: medical errors become a problem for thousands of patients in Germany every year. Even if expert reports confirm an error as the cause of further or new suffering, many injured parties have a long-term legal dispute, said the board of the German Patient Protection Foundation, Eugen Brysch, the German Press Agency in Berlin. The new black and red coalition should therefore help to make sacrifices from treatment errors faster in the future.

The health insurance companies as well as the clinics and doctors should deposit in a fund. “So far, many federal governments have intended to take the insurers and performance providers responsible with at least 60 million euros,” said Brysch. Those affected should be compensated from such a hardship fund. “Even if the intended black and red government is silent in the coalition agreement, she has to put this on her political agenda.”

In need of care, blind or paralyzed

Brysch praised the existing possibilities of having treatment in retrospect for suspected medical mistakes: “So it is possible to have a suspected treatment error for those affected free to assess.” According to the recent annual statistics (2023) of the medical services, experts on behalf of the health insurance companies in 2,679 of a total of 12,438 cases examined to the conclusion: damage has been caused by a treatment error.

Compared to the year before, the number of incidents remained almost unchanged. In around every third of these cases, the result was permanent damage. The medical service classified 180 permanent damage as difficult – patients were then in need of care, blind or paralyzed. 75 patients died due to mistakes from medical staff.

With the medical associations you can also have it examined whether something went wrong during treatment: 7,529 times the suspected cases ended up in their expert commissions and arbitration boards. A treatment error was affirmed in 1,162 cases.

Many damage caused by incorrect treatments are regulated between patients and hospitals or medical practices or by liability insurance or land directly in court. So the number of unreported cases is high. Studies also suggest that the number of actual errors exceeds the number of the resulting allegations many times over.

Error recording should become a mandatory

“But even if these places come to a clear result, many victims threaten a legal dispute for years,” criticized Brysch. Experts have therefore asked for a fund that can provide emergency aid for over 20 years.

“Patient rights not only have to be supported by politics and law,” continued Brysch. “Even with hospitals and resident doctors, it is important to establish an effective error culture.” The foundation board demanded that the systematic recording of so -called critical events that already take place.

Federal Ministry of Health for patient rights for health insurance physicians on patient rights.