The State Claims Agency has already paid out 20% more in compensation in the first eight months of the year compared with the whole of the 2009. The State Claims Agency had already paid compensation of €59.9 million up to August 2010, compared with total compensation payments of €48 million in 2009. At the current rate, the Agency will make compensation payments of nearly €90 million in 2010. This represents an increase in compensation of nearly 50% in 2010 compared with 2009.
The Minister for Health, Mary Harney, has announced some measures to improve patient safety. The most significant are draft healthcare standards developed by the Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa), which has now entered into a public consultation phase.
Minster Harney has said that about 10% of people admitted to hospital experienced an ‘adverse event’, and about 1% of the adverse events would result in injury or death. Speaking about the adverse events, the minister said “Many of them are systemic failings and many of them are avoidable”.
It should also be pointed out that although the rate of adverse events in HSE run hospitals is particularly high, the HSE is not always responsible, such as the recent DePuy recall.