IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/socmed/v195y2017icp83-89.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Changing experience of adverse medical events in the National Health Service: Comparison of two population surveys in 2001 and 2013

Author

Listed:
  • Gray, Alastair M.
  • Fenn, Paul
  • Rickman, Neil
  • Vencappa, Dev

Abstract

Care quality is important to patients and providers, but is hard to measure. This study aimed to examine changes in the frequency and severity of one quality measure - adverse events associated with medical care - in Great Britain over a 12-year period when available resources initially expanded and were subsequently constrained. Data on perceived adverse events, collected from two representative population surveys in 2001 and 2013, were analysed and compared. The samples consisted of 8202 adults aged 15 and over in 2001 and 19,746 adults aged 15 and over in 2013. The main outcome measures were self-reported illness, injury or impairment caused in the opinion of the respondent by medical treatment or care. Respondents were also asked about the perceived severity of harm in terms of health and work, and any actions taken in response. The proportion of all respondents reporting that over the last three years they had suffered some illness, injury or impairment that in their opinion was caused by their medical treatment or care was 2.5% (497/19746) in 2013, compared with 4.8% (391/8202) in 2001, a reduction of 33% after adjusting for age, gender, income and social class differences between the two surveys. Perceived impact on health and work of these events was similar in both surveys, as was the proportion of injured respondents who pursued a legal claim for financial compensation, at 11% (53/497) in 2013 and 10.5% (41/391) in 2001. We also report multivariate analyses of perceived harm rates and severity, and propensity to seek, and accept, compensation. Our results suggest that the NHS became significantly safer over this period when measured by patient perceived harm from medical care. Our survey method could provide a valuable contribution to the monitoring of trends in health-care related adverse events and the impact of patient safety initiatives.

Suggested Citation

  • Gray, Alastair M. & Fenn, Paul & Rickman, Neil & Vencappa, Dev, 2017. "Changing experience of adverse medical events in the National Health Service: Comparison of two population surveys in 2001 and 2013," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 195(C), pages 83-89.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:195:y:2017:i:c:p:83-89
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.11.016
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277953617306809
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.socscimed.2017.11.016?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nicolini, Davide & Waring, Justin & Mengis, Jeanne, 2011. "Policy and practice in the use of root cause analysis to investigate clinical adverse events: Mind the gap," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 73(2), pages 217-225, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Turner, Simon & Higginson, Juliet & Oborne, C. Alice & Thomas, Rebecca E. & Ramsay, Angus I.G. & Fulop, Naomi J., 2014. "Codifying knowledge to improve patient safety: A qualitative study of practice-based interventions," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 169-176.
    2. Waring, Justin & Currie, Graeme & Crompton, Amanda & Bishop, Simon, 2013. "An exploratory study of knowledge brokering in hospital settings: Facilitating knowledge sharing and learning for patient safety?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 98(C), pages 79-86.
    3. Alberto Sardi & Enrico Sorano & Letizia Agostini & Anna Guerrieri & Mirella Angaramo & Franco Ripa, 2020. "L?analisi a priori del rischio sanitario in Regione Piemonte: applicazione del metodo Cartorisk sull?area materno-infantile," MECOSAN, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2020(114), pages 67-88.
    4. Graeme Currie & John Richmond & James Faulconbridge & Claudia Gabbioneta & Daniel Muzio, 2019. "Professional Misconduct in Healthcare: Setting Out a Research Agenda for Work Sociology," Work, Employment & Society, British Sociological Association, vol. 33(1), pages 149-161, February.
    5. Sara A. Kreindler, 2016. "What if implementation is not the problem? Exploring the missing links between knowledge and action," International Journal of Health Planning and Management, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(2), pages 208-226, April.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:195:y:2017:i:c:p:83-89. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/315/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.