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The Second Session of the Medicine and Law Forum Launched

Under the auspices and presence of the Minister of Health, Dr. Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Rabeeah, the Ministry of Health (MOH) will participate in the organization of the second session of the Medicine and Law Forum, which will be held on Saturday evening 29th of Jumada II, 1431 H (corresponding to 12th of June, 2010) at the Holiday Inn Palace in Riyadh in collaboration with the Council of Cooperative Health Insurance, the Saudi Arabian Quality Council and the Saudi Law Training Center.

The Director General of MOH’s Media and Health Awareness, Dr. Khaled Merghalani, said that organizing this session comes as a continuation of the first forum and in appreciation of the role played by science in consolidating scientific experience amid those working in the fields of medicine and law, noting that the health sector is witnessing wide-ranging topics and issues.

Furthermore, Dr. Merghalani noted that the forum will address several issues, including the impact of health disciplines in development, the role of the Saudi Commission for Health Specialties in supporting the quality of medical services and the impact of quality on the patients' rights and physicians’ duties towards their patients. “The forum will tackle also the role played by the Council of Cooperative Health Insurance, the Central Board for Accreditation of Health Institutions and insurance companies in improving performance inside the health facilities and limiting the medical errors,” he said.

Concluding his speech, Dr. Merghalani said that the invitation is open for all health societies, insurance companies, drug companies and factories, hospitals, clinics, polyclinics and medical centers working in the Kingdom to attend the forum which is expected to come out with several recommendations that will serve the health sector as a whole.

The forum will focus on a number of basic issues, including the development of the health services to reduce medical errors, the role of the Saudi Commission for Health Specialties in improving medical services as well as the impact of quality on the patients' rights and physicians’ duties towards their patients. In addition, the forum will highlight the role of the Council of Cooperative Health Insurance in controlling insurance companies, totaling about 30 companies with total capital of more than SR 10 billion.

The forum will address also the role of the Central Board for Accreditation of Health Institutions in improving performance at health facilities and reducing medical errors.

Within the same vein, a number of workshops will be organized on the sidelines of the forum for the members of the medical committees for developing the work of these committees with regard to the drafting of decisions issued by the health institutions' violations consideration committees, as well as the auditing of the Administrative Court and the standard guidelines for penalties on health violations. A number of judges and lawyers specialized in medical errors will participate in these workshops.

It's worth noting here that the Ministry of Health has recently organized a symposium under the title (Medical errors and the mechanism to deal with them). The symposium was attended by Ministers of Health, Justice and Culture and Information and came out with a number of recommendations, including:

Obliging the health sector to apply quality standards and obtain the accreditation
Forcing all health sectors to adopt an approach for monitoring, following up and analyzing medical errors to take advantage of them
Obliging all health sectors to develop necessary programs for reducing medical errors and considering such errors as a serious matter that should be curbed
Establishing specialized departments at hospitals to brief patients on details of any event that might suggest a medical error, with a participation of a trusted and honest person in this regard
Organizing symposiums and workshops to raise the level of awareness among the health practitioners to consider the principles of medical performance safety
Improving the skills of health practitioners to deal with patients in a professional manner, i.e. to explain to the patient the disease and its causes, ways of treatment and expected complications without exaggeration
Improving the scientific and practical level of health practitioners to acquire skills necessary for reducing medical errors
Supporting health sectors in their endeavors to provide all necessary capabilities at hospitals and health centers, including qualified manpower, equipments and devices which help the workers to conduct the correct diagnosis and provide the effective treatment
Identifying the role to be played by each hospital
Warning physicians against conducting any surgery beyond their scientific and practical abilities or their hospitals’ capabilities
Encouraging health sectors to form specialized medical committees at hospitals provided that the members of these committees are honest, wise and scholars
Studying all death and disease cases occurring at hospitals and analyzing them for benefit
Developing a mechanism for hiring physicians and health professionals and establishing permanent offices for recruitment, in addition to supporting these offices for recruiting qualified cadres
Benefiting from the King Abdullah Scholarships Program, particularly in the field of nursing
Facilitating procedures of granting licenses to the local and international health sectors and encouraging them to establish specialized centers, in addition to keeping a close eye on such sectors
Reconsidering and increasing the (Diyya) – financial compensation paid in cases of the loss of life or an organ, or the destruction of utilities.
Paying compensation for any psychological and physical damage which might afflict the patient or the health practitioner
Urging judges to relay on their expertise and to cooperate with their colleagues in defining the Diyya value and compensation without resorting to governmental estimators
Establishing appropriate headquarters for the Legitimate Health Authorities, which show the respectfulness and decency of the place
Reconsidering rewards granted to members of the Legitimate Health Authorities to be equal to that of the other judicial bodies and committees
Urging media outlets to seek accuracy by taking information from the original sources, not from a feuding party, and not to publish anything about the case unless after a final verdict.
Calling on media outlets to publish the news which have proven to be untrue in the same way they have dealt with it in the first time.
Urging media outlets not to announce any medical product unless it was approved by the concerned authorities.