Sore spots between doctors and journalists!

Photo credit: Scientific American

The talk about medical errors and concern about their consequences has increased widely, with mounting calls to the Ministry of Health for tighter control of medical practice to ensure professionalism on the part of medical staff to preserve patients’ rights to quality healthcare. The Medical Council was also urged to expedite consideration and investigation of forwarded complaints - all of which are well within the legal rights of patients.

In the above context, many doctors and officials in the health sector argue that when newspapers report on a few bad actors in the medical profession, it makes conscientious and honest doctors look tarnished, too.

However, none of this should be considered an attack on doctors as whole, nor an attempt to detract from their noble profession. We have a moral obligation both to doctors; by avoiding generalization based on a limited number of cases, and to patients who need to be protected against malpractice.

It's unfortunate that this issue has driven a wedge between doctors and journalists, because some hospital officials believe the press incites the public against the health sector. This is regrettable because it is the role of media to uncover the truth and report on the facts as they are. Having said this, the media also has a duty to protect doctors from reporting that borders on yellow journalism.

To find a treatment for these sore spots between doctors and the press, and to overcome any potential problems between the two, we propose a joint symposium to defuse the tension and agree on a basis of credibility and transparency for dealing with everything that goes on in the health sector and coverage by the media, including medical errors and bad reporting!