The wave of "I'm sorry" laws is part of a movement in the medical industry to encourage doctors to promptly and fully inform patients of errors and, when warranted, to apologize. Some hospitals say apologies help defuse patient anger and stave off lawsuits.
<snip>
The surgeon said that he realizes an apology could come back to haunt him but that he considers saying "I'm sorry" essential to preserving the bond of trust between doctor and patient. Otherwise, "patients think I'm hiding something, I must have done something wrong," he said.
* * * *
The final blow to the bond of trust between me and my doctors came from their adamant assertions that they had done nothing wrong.
Even when I pointed out obvious errors in the medical records, all they did was lie through their teeth, such ridiculous statements as "self-diagnosed means the same as 'diagnosed by a virologist'" and claiming that I told them I stopped working 12 years before I actually did.
When I pointed out that under HIPAA, I was entitled to have those errors corrected, I was told I had no such right.
I finally contacted the Department of Health and Human Services and had a government lawyer provide me the exact text of the law and a written statement that this law did require them to correct anything I could prove was wrong.
Then they lied and said that they never told me I couldn't have errors corrected, when I had the original statement in black and white. Then, instead of just doing it based on what I'd already told them was wrong, they required me to fill out a form and send it to another office, which would then discuss it with the doctors, and decide (probably with the input of a lawyer) which false statements I had proved adequately to warrant being changed.
Even where the handwritten medical history contradicted the typed history, I was going to have to find proof that what the assistant wrote down was actually what I said, they couldn't just correct the falsified typed information by referring to what was written down by the assistant. How do you get a sworn statement from your previous doctor who died?
All they really had to do was make a call to say that they inadvertently wrote 2003 instead of 2000 as the first date of disability, and the errors in the medical records would have been immaterial, because I wouldn't have to rely on the medical records to prove I was entitled to the additional three years of back benefits. But they couldn't even admit to a clerical error.
At any point, they could have settled the lawsuit by admitting they made a mistake and doing what they could to fix the problems that they caused by saying that I wasn't actually disabled at the point that I was essentially bedridden. They refused to do anything other than blaming me.
Their mistakes will dog me the rest of my life, but they didn't think it was worth swallowing their pride long enough to offer an apology. They made it quite clear that the source of all the problems was me. I speak clearly and distinctly, a trained public orator, so it's difficult to see how I could be the problem in their claims that they did not understand me. In several places, it is obvious that they understood me just fine ... and later dictated something quite different from the handwritten notes. How can that be my fault?
How is it my fault that they didn't read the reports from other doctors, when I made sure that those reports were sent to them? Was I supposed to go to the doctor's house, tuck him in, and read him the other doctors' opinions as a bedtime story?
The only thing I did wrong was to believe them when they said "I want to help you", and to trust them to follow the law in keeping accurate medical records. Obviously, some people are not trustworthy and honest. And, unfortunately, some of those people are doctors, whose lies can ruin other people's lives.
No comments:
Post a Comment