U.S. hospitals committed 17 percent fewer medical errors in 2013 than in 2010, leading to the survival of about 50,000 more people, Reuters reported on Tuesday.
The decreased fatality rate was one of a few large-scale improvements in hospital standards and safety protocols studied by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. There was also a 9 percent decline in conditions that develop in hospitals from 2012 to 2013, including pneumonia, bedsores and other infections.
The findings are based on a study of tens of thousands of medical records, but not from before 2010, as data collection was different before that time.
Hospital mistakes were highlighted in 1999, when the Institute of Medicine found that up to 98,000 people die in hospitals every year due to preventable mistakes, like falls, pneumonia and infections.
An inspector in 2010 found that sub-par care in hospitals led to the deaths of 180,000 Medicare patients each year, which insures those 65 or older and the disabled.
How Medicare pays hospitals has greatly improved safety. President Barack Obama's healthcare reform laws require that reimbursement rates for hospitals that re-admit many patients in a month be reduced; because it shows poor care was given the first time.
Because of the regulations and upgrades in hospital safety, patients suffering from conditions acquired in a hospital dropped by 1.3 million people. About $12 billion in avoidable costs were also saved by the improvements, the Huffington Post reported.
"This is welcome news for patients and their families," CMS Deputy Administrator Dr. Patrick Conway said, and represents an "unprecedented decline in patient harm in this country."
