title: Errors and malpractice lawsuits in radiology: what the radiologist needs to know.
abstract: All medical specialties dealing with patients include an intrinsic risk in exposing them to issues resulting from human errors. Radiology is not spared from this risk since it includes "decision-making under conditions of uncertainty." In medical imaging, the line between the word "error" and misdiagnosis or discrepancy is very difficult to demarcate, mainly because the diagnostic process is not a binary relation and it is not always possible to establish if a pathological condition is present or not. The error in radiology is strongly related to the diagnostic process; hence, it can be defined as a "diagnostic error" which represents the most common cause of medical malpractice suits against radiologists. In this paper, the authors described the features of errors occurring in radiology, trying to establish their impact and prevalence. Secondly, some data coming from different countries were compared in order to highlight the most frequent causes leading to malpractice lawsuits in radiology and how the phenomenon of malpractice in this field is represented worldwide.
authors.affiliation: Department of Anatomical, Histological, Forensic and Orthopaedic Sciences, Sapienza University of Rome, Viale Regina Elena 336, 00161, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Francesco Paolo
authors.initials: FP
authors.lastname: Busardò
authors.forename: Paola
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Frati
authors.forename: Alessandro
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Santurro
authors.forename: Simona
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Zaami
authors.forename: Vittorio
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Fineschi
mesh_terms: D003951:Diagnostic Errors / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D005554:Forensic Medicine / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D006801:Humans; D008318:Malpractice / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D011871:Radiology / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D012307:Risk Factors