Wow – opened today’s Wall Street Journal and read a scary article about horrific surgical incidents. What do I mean? Well – imagine sparks from surgical tools starting a fire that consumes gowns, drapes and beds within seconds.
Sounds like a terrible movie – but apparently it does occur. How much? Well that no one is sure of yet. Next year facilities will be forced (if they want to maintain level of Medicare funding) to report these incidents. Until there is hard data, I imagine they are more urban legend, a few stories here and there.
And who is at fault if such a fire occurs or burn? I think of the Ford Roll-over cases. Large vehicle without the right tire pressure. Think surgeon using tool too much – or too long and the tool overheats, or rather, what it the tool isn’t serviced correctly.
Anyway, scary proposition and one I hope never actually happens again.