In a comprehensive study by Dr. Gary Null and his staff, the many hazards of medical care were exposed. Among them was the potential for unnecessary hospitalization that occurs at a rate of nearly nine million occurrences per year.

Dr. Null cited a review of 1,132 hospitalization records by two doctors that was completed in 2001. This review showed that 23% of all these admissions were inappropriate and that an additional 17% could have been handled on an outpatient basis.

To verify the correctness of this evaluation, these figures were compared to a similar review done in 1990. The 1990 review showed that 23.5% of all admissions were unnecessary and a 1999 review reported a figure of 24%.

Given that there were 37 milliontotal hospital admissions in 2001, a rate of 23% for unnecessary admissions means that 8,925,033 people were unnecessarily admitted to hospitals in 2001. Thus they were unnecessarily exposed to all the hazards of hospital stays including unnecessary procedures, drug reactions and interactions, medical errors and infections originating from the hospital stay itself.

SOURCE: http://www.healthsentinel.com/printer.php?id=033title=Medicine+Found+to+be+the+Number+One+Cause+of+Death&event=org_news_print_list_item&printerfriendly=1&prefix=org_news_