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Table 4 Who to Disclose Medical Error to Patients According to Personal Preference and Perceptions of Norm and Current Practice

From: Which medical error to disclose to patients and by whom? Public preference and perceptions of norm and current practice

 

Any employee

Any physician

At-fault-physician

Manager of at-fault-physician

Medical director

Chief executive director

Preference [867]

16 (1.8)

105 (12.1)

518 (59.7)

133 (15.3)

54 (6.2)

41 (4.7)

Perception of Norm [878]

25 (2.8)

120 (13.7)

502 (57.2)

147 (16.7)

46 (5.2)

38 (4.3)

Perception of Practice [758]

74 (9.8)

238 (31.4)

258 (34.0)

99 (13.1)

43 (5.7)

46 (6.1)

  1. "Any employee", "any physician", "at-fault-physician", "manager of at-fault-physician", "medical director", and "chief executive director" correspond, respectively, to statements 1 to 6 in Table 1(b). Numbers between [·] represent the number of responses. Data indicate the number (%) of respondents who chose the corresponding statement. Chi square test for the null hypothesis of random distribution was significant (P < 0.001) for each of the three questionnaires. Kendall's W coefficient of concordance (comparing the choices in the 3 questionnaires) was 0.075 (P < 0.001). Wilcoxon signed ranks test: preference vs. perception of norm, P = 0.33; preference vs. perception of current practice, p < 0.001; perception of norm vs. perception of current practice, P < 0.001.
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BMC Medical Ethics

ISSN: 1472-6939

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