A university teacher, Professor Leroy Edozien, talked about the large number of medical accidents happening worldwide. He said that these accidents cause more than three million deaths every year across the globe.
He shared this information at the third Postgraduate School Interdisciplinary Discourse Lecture at the University of Medical Sciences (UNIMED) in Ondo.
Edozien, who has degrees in medical science, medicine, and law, explained that a patient safety incident, also called a medical accident, is an event that causes or could cause unnecessary harm to a patient.
He said these incidents include mistakes with medicines, mixing up patients, errors during blood transfusions, and wrong diagnoses, among other problems.
The professor, who also teaches at UNIMED, said that the number of patient safety incidents is very high but people do not fully understand how serious it is.
He explained, “Around the world, one out of every ten patients is harmed during medical care. In poorer countries, one in four hospital stays leads to harm. Also, one in 24 people die because of unsafe hospital care. In Nigeria, nearly half of doctors, pharmacists, and nurses admit to making medication mistakes.”
He added that these problems have serious effects on patients, their families, doctors, and the whole country. These effects include physical and emotional pain, stress, and financial problems.
The professor gave real examples from Nigeria and other countries. He suggested ways to reduce these medical accidents.
He said that teaching about patient safety and good clinical management would help a lot.
Before his speech, Professor Michael Asuzu, the Dean of the Postgraduate School, said the lecture series aims to bring together university teachers who have done research or work that involves different fields working together. This teamwork is an important goal for UNIMED.
