Tragedy struck a critical access hospital in Maine, when a medical overdose killed a man earlier this month. Hospital officials are reportedly calling the death a result of human error, and a spokesman for the hospital says it is difficult to say whether or not having an electronic health records system in place would have prevented this from happening.
Mayo Regional Hospital is located in Dover-Foxcroft, a town in Piscataquis County, Maine, with a population of roughly 4,211 people. The 25-bed hospital has 22 physicians and 375 staff members.
Tom Lizotte, the hospital director of marketing and community relations, said hospital officials have "been transparent and openly admitted the error." The hospital met with a local newspaper, the Bangor Daily News (BDN), when they went public with the error.
According to the BDN article a middle-aged man was admitted to the emergency room at 9 p.m. on June 4 with "symptoms of anaphylaxis — an acute allergic reaction that included facial swelling and some thickening of the tongue."
The man was initially given 0.3 milligrams of epinephrine, but later when his symptoms reoccurred was given 3 milligrams of epinephrine, or 10 times the normal dose, which ultimately resulted in his death, according to the BDN article.
Lizotte said the hospital currently uses a Pyxis medication distribution system to track all medications and coding. The hospital is also rolling out a practice management and electronic health records system in October to its physician practices. He says the first offices are expected to go live in 2011.
Mayo Regional's emergency department is also currently negotiating a contract for an EHR system which is slated to go live in 2011, said Lizotte. It will streamline workflow, create and track all medical records and provide access to dug interaction data, he said.
"No matter what systems you have in place, it comes down to humans double-checking and agreeing on processes," said Lizotte.
He says it's hard to make a "blanket statement" that having the EHR system in place would have prevented this from happening. "It may have made it much more difficult for it to happen," he says – by, for example, "red flagging the second dosage immediately."
The hospital, which has a Web site and Facebook page decided to go to the local newspaper, rather than make the announcement on either site because hospital officials didn't think they were "appropriate" outlets to inform the public, due to the sensitive nature of the case.
"We are not trying to manage the news," said Lizotte. "We are just trying to get it out there. You have to step forward and admit responsibility, show remorse to the family, and tell the community," he says.
