Medical Mistakes, Third-Leading Cause of Death in US

A new report says medical errors are the third-leading cause of death in the United States.

一份新的报告说，医疗失误是美国第三大死因。

Researchers at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, say medical errors cause more than 250,000 deaths every year.

马里兰州巴尔的摩约翰霍普金斯大学的研究人员说，医疗失误每年造成25万人死亡。

If the research is correct, it means deaths caused by doctors' errors are greater in number than deaths by respiratory disease.

如果这项研究是正确的，那就意味着由医生的错误导致的死亡人数比由呼吸道疾病导致的死亡人数还要多。

That number also is higher than the 150,000 deaths yearly reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

这一数字也高于疾病预防控制中心每年报告的15万人死亡人数。

The CDC keeps the official statistics about causes of death in the U.S. The Johns Hopkins researchers say the CDC's way of collecting data "fails to classify medical errors separately on the death certificate."

疾病预防控制中心保留着美国官方的死因统计数据。约翰霍普金斯大学的研究人员说，疾病预防控制中心收集数据的方式“未能在死亡证明上对医疗错误进行单独分类”。

Dr. Martin Makary is a professor of surgery at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He is also an authority on health reform. He says there is no standardized method for collecting national statistics about such medical care problems.

马丁·马卡里博士是约翰·霍普金斯大学医学院外科教授。他也是医疗改革的权威。他说，没有标准化的方法来收集有关此类医疗问题的国家统计数据。

The CDC's methods for following medical-error deaths were adopted in 1949, according to the researchers. They say the record-keeping needs to be changed to account for medical mistakes.

研究人员称，疾病预防控制中心追踪医疗差错死亡的方法是1949年采用的。他们说需要改变记录以解释医疗错误。

Dr. Makary said, "At that time, it was under-recognized that diagnostic errors, medical mistakes, and the absence of safety nets could result in someone's death."

马卡里博士说：“当时，人们还没有充分认识到，诊断错误、医疗错误以及没有安全网都可能导致某人死亡。”

He added, "medical errors were unintentionally excluded from national health statistics" for that reason.

他还说，“医疗差错无意中被排除在国家卫生统计之外”。

The researchers studied death rate data from 2000 to 2008. They then took information about hospitalization rates from 2013. Using that data, they determined that medical errors caused 251,000 deaths each year out of more than 35 million hospitalizations.

研究人员研究了2000年至2008年的死亡率数据。然后他们获取了2013年的住院率信息。利用这些数据，他们确定在3500多万住院病人中，医疗失误每年造成25.1万人死亡。

This, researchers say, represents 9.5 percent of all deaths in the U.S. each year.

研究人员说，这占美国每年死亡人数的9.5%。

In 2013, the CDC said heart disease was the leading cause of death in the U.S., followed by cancer and respiratory disease.

2013年，疾控中心表示，心脏病是美国的主要死因，其次是癌症和呼吸道疾病。

"Top-ranked causes of death as reported by the CDC inform our country's research funding and public health priorities," Dr. Makary said.

马卡里博士说：“疾病预防控制中心报告的排名靠前的死因为我们国家的研究资金和公共卫生优先事项提供了信息。”

"Right now, cancer and heart disease get a ton of attention, but since medical errors don't appear on the list, the problem doesn't get the funding and attention it deserves," he said.

他说：“现在，癌症和心脏病得到了大量的关注，但由于医疗失误没有出现在名单上，这个问题没有得到应有的资金和关注。”

The researchers warn that medical errors are not the same thing as the work of bad doctors. They say medical mistakes are the result of problems in medical systems and the coordination of care and insurance coverage.

研究人员警告说，医疗错误与坏医生的工作不同。他们说，医疗失误是医疗系统问题以及医疗和保险范围协调的结果。

The study says its findings should help raise awareness about the problem and support research to prevent medical errors.

这项研究说，它的发现应该有助于提高人们对这个问题的认识，并支持防止医疗失误的研究。

I'm Mario Ritter.