I wish I hadn’t done that — the founding concept
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts
Most scientific articles are written primarily not for the dissemination of medical knowledge, but rather for the advancement of the reputation of the authors.
Consequently, our ophthalmic literature is presently glutted with an imbalanced number of success stories.
Our failures find their way into print much more rarely, and even then, they typically take the form of “catastrophic events that were not my fault.”
Reports of surgical complications, born of pure poor decision-making, are almost nonexistent. They are embarrassing to describe, possibly legally implicating and lowly regarded scientifically.
Nevertheless, I am under the personal impression that I have learned the most in my career primarily from my own mistakes and secondarily from the mistakes of others, ie, the special advice of “what not to do.”
The absence of a literature of mistakes, of perfectly preventable “seemed good at the time” blunders, may therefore be one the most important deficits in our modern educational publications.
This new monthly column does not have the creation of such literature as its aim. Instead, it intends to have the much more modest goal of describing my own “I wish I hadn’t done that” moments.
I hope that readers will find “I Wish I Hadn’t Done That” interesting and informative, or at least gratifying to note that you knew better than to commit whatever offense you find me struggling with. I also invite any sympathizers to write me directly, either to share your own stories or to correct me further if you find I am still in error.
- For more information:
- Jack S. Parker, MD, PhD, can be reached at Parker Cornea, 3745 Corporate Woods Drive, Vestavia Hills, AL 35242; email: jack.parker@gmail.com.
Collapse
Read more about
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts