A summary of sentinel events reviewed by The Joint Commission reveals that more than 1,200 such events occurred last year.
That number indicates a growing incidence of reviewed events since 1995. There were 418 reviewable sentinel events in 2004; up to 740 events in 2007; 968 events in 2009 and 1,243 events in 2011. From 2004 to 2011, there were 6,094 total reviewable sentinel events.
The Joint Commission report also showed the type of sentinel event with the higher number of occurrences in 2011 includes delay in treatment (138 events), operative/post-operative complication (133 events), suicide (131 events), unintended retention of a foreign object (188 events) and wrong-patient/wrong-site/wrong-procedure (152 events).
A majority (64 percent) of total sentinel events from 2004-2011 occurred in the hospital setting, while 4.3 percent and 0.5 percent occurred in ambulatory surgery centers and office-based centers, respectively. In addition, approximately 60 percent of sentinel events from 2004 to 2011 resulted in death.
That number indicates a growing incidence of reviewed events since 1995. There were 418 reviewable sentinel events in 2004; up to 740 events in 2007; 968 events in 2009 and 1,243 events in 2011. From 2004 to 2011, there were 6,094 total reviewable sentinel events.
The Joint Commission report also showed the type of sentinel event with the higher number of occurrences in 2011 includes delay in treatment (138 events), operative/post-operative complication (133 events), suicide (131 events), unintended retention of a foreign object (188 events) and wrong-patient/wrong-site/wrong-procedure (152 events).
A majority (64 percent) of total sentinel events from 2004-2011 occurred in the hospital setting, while 4.3 percent and 0.5 percent occurred in ambulatory surgery centers and office-based centers, respectively. In addition, approximately 60 percent of sentinel events from 2004 to 2011 resulted in death.
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