Diagnostic error: more than a point

Talking  about Diagnostic Error improvement some details were enumerated at the last DEM meeting hosted in Chicago in September 2013: the proper definition of the concept and the difficult task for developing a measure. We are now describing the “iceberg point” because, as we have learned, not all of diagnostic error have a “visible” consequence…

“Adverse events” related to Diagnostic Error are very difficult to measure because they occurs in a temporal time of the whole diagnostic process. And, to complicate things more, we have another definition, the concept of “near misses”, situations without a Diagnostic Error outcome but very close to them. If we want to improve we need to know this dinamic.