Patients use an internet technology to report when things go wrong

BACKGROUND: As patients directly experience harm from adverse events, investigators have proposed patient-report to complement professional reporting of adverse events. OBJECTIVE: To investigate how an automated health assessment system can be used to identify adverse events. DESIGN AND SETTING: Internet survey responses from April 2003 to April 2005 involving communities and clinical practices across the USA. PATIENTS: 44,860 adults aged 19-69 years. OUTCOME: Patient perceptions of adverse events experienced during the previous year. Independent legal review was also used to estimate how many patient-reports were serious enough to be potentially compensable. RESULTS: Although patient reports of possible adverse events was low (1.4%), the percentage of adverse events was eight times higher for patients with the greatest burden of illness than for those with the least (3.4% vs 0.4%). Two expert malpractice attorneys agreed that 9% of the adverse events seemed to be serious. CONCLUSIONS: PATIENTS will use internet technology to report their perceptions of health-related adverse events. Some of the patient-reported events reported will be serious.