You Should Not Get Sick From A Hospital
Hospital stays are intended to make patients feel better not worse. According to the New England Journal of Medicine two million patients a year get infections during their hospital stay resulting in 90,000 deaths.
The most common types of infections acquired in hospitals are urinary tract infections, wound infections, staff infections and pneumonia. The latter two can prove to be the most deadly. Pneumonia can cause acute respiratory failure and staph infections can enter the blood stream and attack organs. Patients on ventilators, IV’s and recovering from surgery are at highest risk.
Infections can be caused by unclean hands, contaminated medical equipment, and visitors. The majority of these infections are preventable by enforcing and practicing proper sanitary practices. Most experts agree that the number one way to prevent hospital acquired infections is for health care workers to wash their hands. Other practices include sterilization of medical equipment, improved ventilation systems in operating rooms, and testing new patients to determine if they are carrying antibiotic-resistant infections (and isolating them, if necessary).
If you think a hospital acquired infection caused a member of your family to become seriously ill or die, call an experienced medical malpractice lawyer as soon as possible.
Please read this article from CNN Health for more information.
