Doctors Are 9,000 Times More Likely to Accidentally Kill You Than Gun Owners

Shocking news for patients like me. I always thought the hospital was more dangerous than home anyway because of the super bugs being produced at the hospital. Well, at least I won't need to undergo any surgery soon. This sure isn't reaffirming my faith in healthcare.

Janet M. Corrigan is the IOM's director of health care services. The Institute is a private, nonprofit organization that provides health policy advice under a congressional charter to the National Academy of Sciences. She told reporters at a Capitol Hill briefing May 8 that the study did not look at medical-error deaths at nursing homes, emergency rooms or in doctors' offices. The mortality estimates are low also because most of the information was based on medical record reviews. Medical errors are a problem that has been hidden from the public for far to long.

Even worse than the original article (click here) reported, and the original study was bad enough.

Here are some other numbers to ponder:

Number of physicians in the US = 700,000
Accidental deaths caused by physicians per year = 120,000
Accidental deaths per physician = 0.171

Number of gun owners in the US = 80,000,000
Number of accidental gun deaths per year (all age groups) = 1,500
Accidental deaths per gun owner = 0.0000188

Therefore, doctors are approximately 9,000 times more dangerous than gun owners.

articles.mercola.com...

Isn't this kind of obvious? Most people go to doctors, not pick fights with gun owners.

I have zero faith in these 'studies' any how but technically this conclusion you have drawn is flawed and misleading. I'm a bit busy to do the maths but to accurately represent this one must take into account the total number of deaths caused by guns (this includes acciedntal deaths and acts of murder committed with a firearm as opposed to just accidental deaths like the original post shows) and the total number of accidental deaths (accidental deaths only since the physicians purpose is to save lives whereas the purpose of the gun is strictly killing) caused by physicians and then you'll see which is statistically more dangerous.




Hope this makes sense.

Number of physicians in the US = 700,000
Accidental deaths caused by physicians per year = 120,000
Accidental deaths per physician = 0.171
[/quote


Do they mean an accidental death specifically caused by something that the physician could have controlled?
I have a feeling that those numbers are including everyone dying. For example, if someone walks into the hospital with a bullet in their chest, and dies the next day, I don't think think that should be counted as an accidentally death under a physicians care. But I feel like it is included in those numbers

A few months back, I went to see my doctor. I was having serious adverse reactions to a medication he prescribed. So, he names a different medication and writes out the prescription. I get it filled, and what does it say on the bottle? Generic for the prescription I was having the side effects from.

I am not a violent person, but I wanted to march back to his office and slug him.

I figure one of two things happened. The dr. was to dumb to realize he was prescribing me the same exact medication, or he thought I was lying about the side effects and thought I was to dumb to notice it was the same medication. Needless to say I will not be going back for my follow up.

It was around that time I discovered Dr. Mercola and have since then cured the problem myself with diet modification.

Doctors are one thing, but let's think about surgeons for a moment.

My grandfather went to get his tonsils removed ages ago and almost died from blood loss because a miniscule part of his neck was sliced by accident.

Absolute incompetence on the practitioners part. My grandfather only lived due to emergency blood transfusions, and a lot of them. It was a messy situation.

He told me this story when I was young and ever since then the only word to strike more queasiness and fear into my heart than 'cockroach' is 'surgeon'.

reply to post by calstorm


Well you actually shouldn't be as mad as you think you should be. Generic can be wayyy different than brand name. Trust me, I know a few friends very into prescription drugs. They will first handedly tell you that generic vs. brand name can give you wayyy different reactions as far as side effects go