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Duty Hour Restrictions |
The images of exhausted interns after days of duty, and their patients suffering medical errors, placed public pressure on the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (AAGME) to create duty hour restrictions on US residency programs in 2003. The hope was these restrictions would greatly improve patient safety. However, improvements in resident well-being and patient safety were not as robust as hoped. In 2011, duty hours were again restricted; in a recently published study, intern's concerns about making a serious medical error increased, while scores measuring their well-being and hours slept were unchanged. One possible explanation for continued patient safety concerns is the increased number of handoffs between shifts. Unfortunately, this simple solution to improve patient safety is not as simple as it looks. |
