As a member of the general public, I do find it hard to believe this sort of thing isn't done already.
As a victim of a minor surgical mishap myself (general anaesthesia applied when it shouldn't have been), I can definitely believe "incidents" happen all the time.
"I do find it hard to believe this sort of thing isn't done already."
I showed a similar article to my wife (has worked in healthcare for 20+ years) and she said "Oh yes, we do that all the time. Everything has a check-list." So if it makes a difference, I guess it is either mandated for higher-level staff (surgeons and consultants who are often a law unto themselves) or rigidly enforced at all levels.
Also, the study might show bias because people will do the lists if they know it's being assessed for an experiment, but might ignore it on a day-to-day basis.
Any doctor who reads the study and sees the 50% reduction in death rate in surgeries and 90% reduction in accidental deaths in the ICU would be negligent to ignore checklists.
If this surgery checklist and the ICU checklist were to be implemented in every hospital, they would save more lives than all new medications introduced in the last five years, combined. Ignoring results like that is just asinine.
"Any doctor who reads the study and sees the 50% reduction in death rate in surgeries and 90% reduction in accidental deaths in the ICU would be negligent to ignore checklists."
Although I've only had non-trivial procedures done on me once or twice, I've never seen a checklist used.
As for ignoring checklists on a day to day basis, this could be solved by making them a required part of a patient's medical record. That way, doctors are constantly being assessed on the basis of completing a checklist. You could even publish stats on it.
"No checklist, no payment" would also be a good way to enforce it.
As a victim of a minor surgical mishap myself (general anaesthesia applied when it shouldn't have been), I can definitely believe "incidents" happen all the time.