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{
    "id": 1567447,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1567447/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 474,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Sen. Oketch Gicheru",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "providers on the medical errors in our hospitals. The senior, Sen. (Dr.) Boni Khalwale, who was once a very good doctor, will tell you that this idea of getting these reports involves a strategy that is informed by law. It is very important that we do not just have our sight in dealing with one institution and holding that one institution to account, but also hold ourselves to account as lawmakers. For the first time, we can put in place laws that are implementable in terms of putting up strategies that will ensure that when medical errors arise in hospitals, they are dealt with. This is a question where a medical error happens, then a misdiagnosis follows and then the handling of the patient continues. The patient then suffers subsequent errors until she meets her death. It means that there is a very serious substantive problem of recording and reporting of a medical error from the first instance to the last not only by the doctors in question, but also the clinical providers. That is something that we must examine as a House from this case study and ensure that we can put serious laws that will ensure that when a medical error occurs, it is properly recorded and addressed before subsequent handling of a patient. This should not only happen in MTRH, but across all our hospitals in the country. I am worried because this is an adverse event. The medics in the House will understand that there is always a difference between adverse events in terms of medical errors, sentinel events, active events as well as just latent errors that sometimes happen. The reason I bring this up is because if we do not put up proper laws that can arrest all these kinds of events that happen in our hospitals, some might not lead to death, but lead to patients getting into a serious problem in their lives. Sometimes those issues can go unattended in a hospital and then they develop complications later in life. This includes things like infections that can occur because of negligence and medical errors while handling a simple medical procedure. If all these are not captured, then we have a sick nation; a sick nation in that, if it is not an adverse event that can led to death, then any other complication does not matter. It should matter that when you leave a medical institution, you should have a better life than when you went there. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, my worry here is that if we do not have a proper legal framework that allows for reporting then if there is no situation whereby somebody has died, any other complication will not matter. It is important that this recommendation from the Committee on Health informs our action as policymakers, to ensure that we arrest other forms of medical errors that could lead to other complications that are not only death scenarios. This also calls on us as policymakers, legislatures and Government to rethink the kind of collaborative platform that we try to put for inter-professional teams in our entire medicare. This is where I passionately come again on this Floor to talk about the issue of the Universal Health Coverage (UHC) workers. Sometimes, it is very easy for political leaders to just make reckless statements that we do not have money to take care of UHC workers, mainstream them into permanent and pensionable contracts or put them into the payroll of counties and follow that with money."
}