St. Louis P-D shows how hard getting info on medical errors is
- Image by Flickr user Nick J Webb.
Jeremy Kohler and Blythe Bernhard of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch found public information about serious medical errors rarely exists. So along with their story about a 16-year-old girl’s death caused by improper restraining in a hospital, they chronicled their challenges in gathering information about a surgeon who removed the wrong kidney. They write:
“You start with the Joint Commission, an organization that accredits hospitals. It confirms a ‘wrong-site’ surgery occurred at DePaul in 2007 but won’t tell you more.
Someone probably sued, right? But no court file exists.
The state tracks all malpractice claims, even those that don’t end up in court. So, you ask the Missouri Division of Insurance for a copy of its malpractice database. The agency removes identifiers before providing it.”
Today’s Tip: Tell readers how you found your information, Jeremy says.
Jeremy Kohler
“Readers do like to hear about what process we use,” he says. “If you give them some insight, that helps.”
The process story ran as a sidebar to the main story to illustrate the problem, he says. Information about the girl’s death was available because her case was ruled a homicide.
He says he and Blythe wrote the process story as a chronology and presented it to their editors, who liked it. “It’s more telling than a traditional story.” CJR also sang the Post-Dispatch’s praises for its transparency.
Being open can have some challenges, as Rachel Smolkin notes in this piece for the American Journalism Review. She asks the questions: “Is more transparency always better, or are there dangers lurking within an otherwise healthy movement? In short, is the pressure for explaining spiraling out of control?”
