title: Hospital disclosure practices: results of a national survey.
abstract: New patient safety standards from JCAHO that require hospitals to disclose to patients all unexpected outcomes of care took effect 1 July 2001. In an early 2002 survey of risk managers at a nationally representative sample of hospitals, the vast majority reported that their hospital's practice was to disclose harm at least some of the time, although only one-third of hospitals actually had board-approved policies in place. More than half of respondents reported that they would always disclose a death or serious injury, but when presented with actual clinical scenarios, respondents were much less likely to disclose preventable harms than to disclose nonpreventable harms of comparable severity. Reluctance to disclose preventable harms was twice as likely to occur at hospitals having major concerns about the malpractice implications of disclosure.
authors.affiliation: Radio New Zealand, Wellington.
authors.forename: Rae M
authors.initials: RM
authors.lastname: Lamb
authors.forename: David M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Studdert
authors.forename: Richard M J
authors.initials: RM
authors.lastname: Bohmer
authors.forename: Donald M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Berwick
authors.forename: Troyen A
authors.initials: TA
authors.lastname: Brennan
mesh_terms: D019538:Health Care Surveys; D006739:Hospital Administration / Q000592:standards* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D007591:Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations; D019300:Medical Errors / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D016134:Organizational Policy; D010344:Patient Advocacy; D017751:Safety Management / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000592:standards*; D014342:Truth Disclosure; D014481:United States