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. 1997 Sep;14(5):290-2.
doi: 10.1136/emj.14.5.290.

A scale for measuring the severity of diagnostic errors in accident and emergency departments

H R Guly  1
Affiliations

A scale for measuring the severity of diagnostic errors in accident and emergency departments

H R Guly. J Accid Emerg Med. 1997 Sep.

Abstract

Objective: To design and test a simple scale for measuring the severity of diagnostic errors occurring in accident and emergency (A&E) departments.

Methods: Empirical design of a scale which indicates the severity of errors on a scale of 1 to 7. It is obtained by adding two scores which indicate the additional treatment which a patient would have received and the follow up which would have been organised if the correct diagnosis had been made initially.

Results: The misdiagnosis severity score (MSS) revealed 166 diagnostic errors in injuries treated in an A&E department over one years. The scoring system allowed the more significant errors to be separated from the less significant ones.

Conclusions: The MSS proved useful in describing the errors made in an A&E department.

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