Wrist malpractice claims in Northern Norway 2005–2014. Lessons to be learned

ABSTRACT

Rough weather conditions in the subarctic areas of Norway may influence on the risk of wrist fracture. We implemented data from the Norwegian System of Patient Injury Compensation (NPE). All claims due to wrist surgery, performed at the public hospitals in Northern Norway, during 2005-2014 were analyzed. We employed the ICD-10 classification codes S52.5 (fracture of distal end of radius) and S52.6 (fracture of distal end of radius and ulna). Treatment was defined by NCSP codes. 84 patients (0.3%) complained. Females complained four times more often than males did (P = 0.005) and received five times more frequently a compensation (P < 0.001). NPE accepted 34 claims (40%) for injury compensation (0.1% of patients). The percentage of claims accepted for compensation decreased from 48% to 30% during study period, probably due to delay in filling claims. The main causes of complains were pain, reduced range of motion, malfunction and weakness (35/84). The main causes of compensation were “operative treatment should have been performed” (14/34) and “wrong operative method applied” (13/34). The mean amount per compensation was €14,927 (€0–€52,995). Stonger focus on quality of care, updated guidelines and shared decission-making may reduce the number og complains and compensations.

KEYWORDS:

• Wrist surgery
• complains
• compensation
• Northern Norway

Acknowledgments

None

Disclosure statement

The authors confirm that there are no conflicts of interest associated with this publication. The authors, their immediate family and any research foundation with which they are affiliated did not receive any financial payments or other benefits from any commercial entity related to the subject of this article. There was no outside funding or grants received that assisted in this study.

Additional information

Funding

This research did not receive any specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-profit sector. The publication charges for this article have been funded by a grant from the publication fund of UiT – The Arctic University of Norway.