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A rationale and framework for addressing physician cognitive impairment

Medical error is costly, in terms of the health and wellbeing of the patient, their family, and the financial burden placed on the medical system. Reducing medical error is paramount to minimizing harm and improving outcomes. One potential source of medical error is physician cognitive impairment. D...

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Autores principales: Del Bene, Victor A., Geldmacher, David S., Howard, George, Brown, Catherine, Turnipseed, Elizabeth, Fry, T. Charles, Jones, Keith A., Lazar, Ronald M.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10485616/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37693707
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2023.1245770
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author Del Bene, Victor A.
Geldmacher, David S.
Howard, George
Brown, Catherine
Turnipseed, Elizabeth
Fry, T. Charles
Jones, Keith A.
Lazar, Ronald M.
author_facet Del Bene, Victor A.
Geldmacher, David S.
Howard, George
Brown, Catherine
Turnipseed, Elizabeth
Fry, T. Charles
Jones, Keith A.
Lazar, Ronald M.
author_sort Del Bene, Victor A.
collection PubMed
description Medical error is costly, in terms of the health and wellbeing of the patient, their family, and the financial burden placed on the medical system. Reducing medical error is paramount to minimizing harm and improving outcomes. One potential source of medical error is physician cognitive impairment. Determining how to effectively assess and mange physician cognitive impairment is an important, albeit difficult problem to address. There have been calls and attempts to implement age-based cognitive screening, but this approach is not optimal. Instead, we propose that neuropsychological assessment is the gold standard for fitness-for-duty evaluations and that there is a need for the development of physician-based, normative data to improve these evaluations. Here, we outline the framework of our research protocol in a large, academic medical center, in partnership with hospital leadership and legal counsel, which can be modeled by other medical centers. With high rates of physician burnout and an aging physician population, the United States is facing a looming public health crisis that requires proactive management.
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spelling pubmed-104856162023-09-09 A rationale and framework for addressing physician cognitive impairment Del Bene, Victor A. Geldmacher, David S. Howard, George Brown, Catherine Turnipseed, Elizabeth Fry, T. Charles Jones, Keith A. Lazar, Ronald M. Front Public Health Public Health Medical error is costly, in terms of the health and wellbeing of the patient, their family, and the financial burden placed on the medical system. Reducing medical error is paramount to minimizing harm and improving outcomes. One potential source of medical error is physician cognitive impairment. Determining how to effectively assess and mange physician cognitive impairment is an important, albeit difficult problem to address. There have been calls and attempts to implement age-based cognitive screening, but this approach is not optimal. Instead, we propose that neuropsychological assessment is the gold standard for fitness-for-duty evaluations and that there is a need for the development of physician-based, normative data to improve these evaluations. Here, we outline the framework of our research protocol in a large, academic medical center, in partnership with hospital leadership and legal counsel, which can be modeled by other medical centers. With high rates of physician burnout and an aging physician population, the United States is facing a looming public health crisis that requires proactive management. Frontiers Media S.A. 2023-08-25 /pmc/articles/PMC10485616/ /pubmed/37693707 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2023.1245770 Text en Copyright © 2023 Del Bene, Geldmacher, Howard, Brown, Turnipseed, Fry, Jones and Lazar. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Public Health
Del Bene, Victor A.
Geldmacher, David S.
Howard, George
Brown, Catherine
Turnipseed, Elizabeth
Fry, T. Charles
Jones, Keith A.
Lazar, Ronald M.
A rationale and framework for addressing physician cognitive impairment
title A rationale and framework for addressing physician cognitive impairment
title_full A rationale and framework for addressing physician cognitive impairment
title_fullStr A rationale and framework for addressing physician cognitive impairment
title_full_unstemmed A rationale and framework for addressing physician cognitive impairment
title_short A rationale and framework for addressing physician cognitive impairment
title_sort rationale and framework for addressing physician cognitive impairment
topic Public Health
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10485616/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37693707
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2023.1245770
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