The Lebanon Reporter
Lebanon — Witham Hospital had one reported incident in 2009 according to the Indiana Medical Error Report — one retention of a foreign object in a patient after surgery.
But Tammy Rabe, director of marketing and communications for Witham Health Services, said the outcome was positive and there was no harm to the patient.
“Witham Health Services has a tradition of excellence regarding quality health care,” she said. “In keeping with the governor’s culture to encourage open discussion so that initiatives can be developed to prevent mistakes, we report any error that may help develop best practices aimed at reducing a medical error.”
Witham is accredited by the Joint Commission — formerly the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health Care Organizations. Because of accreditation, Rabe said that if an error is determined, the hospital investigates to determine where a mistake could be eliminated in the future and to prevent adverse effects.
“We have operational processes in place to minimize the likelihood of errors and will continue the Witham tradition of providing quality health care,” she said.
Twenty-three other hospitals reported just one incident, including Clarian North in Carmel, Clarian West in Avon, Home in Lafayette, St. Clare in Crawfordsville, and Community South, Indiana Orthopedic and Wishard all in Indianapolis. No hospitals had zero incidents.
Hospitals reporting two incidents numbered eight, including Clarian Arnett and St. Elizabeth Medical Center in Lafayette and Community North and Kindred in Indianapolis.
Five hospitals reported three incidents; four hospitals, including St. Vincent and St. Vincent Heart in Indianapolis, reported four.
Clarian in Indianapolis, which includes Methodist, Indiana University and Riley hospitals, reported the most incidents at 18. But it also had the highest number of procedures at 65,738; outpatient visits at 168,689; and inpatient discharges at 56,022.
Witham reported 6,180 procedures, 20,186 outpatient visits and 2,621 inpatient discharges.
