I'm in the midst of trying to get a "minor" paperwork error sorted -  at this stage it's resulted in no harm, but this drives me nuts.

I'm advocating for a patient with a serious but treatable condition.  All specialists have been wonderful, thorough.  At hospital pre-admission (a few days before surgery) after meeting with registrar, anaesthetist, then  - with a nurse doing BPs, weighing, she's reading to herself some notes from the DHB admission form on screen out loud when my ears prick up, as there were two aspects to their records on diagnosis which weren't consistent with notes from pathology and radiology.  One I'd assumed to be a simple typo (one letter wrong on a commonly used acronym perhaps on some record, then "expanded" back into a wrong full description).  I don't "think" I'm right here - I'm absolutely 100% sure I'm right, specific biomarkers were identified which effectively rule out the diagnosis they've got on their paperwork.   The other possible "mistake" I put down at that time to normal margin of error / variation between estimates from different medical imaging techniques, it was a little higher than expected, I've read research data indicating say typical 20% variance, this was about 50%, which is possible but at the high end.  But WTF - I've now looked back and they got that wrong too - referring back to the actual radiology notes / measurements and it falls back within the 20% margin of error.  I have little doubt what happened here is that someone has typed in notes from another patient into this patient's records. Someone somewhere has had two sets of records open on their desk (or computer desktop). If they've also transposed their records the other way around, then hmmmm.  

Now all this is actually so obvious, it's easily sorted...  I asked the nurse at pre-admission to sort it, yup.  I mentioned it to the registrar before the patient was wheeled in to surgery, yup.  The operation has been completed, the patient is home, doing fine.  I have had a quick look at the records / discharge notes, and sure enough nothing has changed, the records still show the incorrect diagnosis.

This actually does have potential implications for follow-up treatment.  Specialists - no, they'll refer back to their notes.  Generalists and admin - yes.  So far what I've told them has fallen on deaf ears, they assume I'm an interfering know-it-all idiot on some kind of a mission.  Well I absolutely am on a mission - there is no way I want that incorrect diagnostic information popping up on this patient's records ever again. The records must be corrected. Their business not mine, but they better be 100% sure they haven't got this stuffed up with another patient. It could lead to a future mistake - and that could actually have fatal consequences.

I really wanted and tried to get this sorted with minimum fuss.  Their business again - to a point - how they go about looking at preventing rubbish like this happening.  I've been at this patient's side at every step and for every appointment and procedure except theatre itself. They check and counter-check (probably hundreds of times now) patient ID, DOB, address etc, yet here they've made a serious mistake which could have the same consequences (wrong treatment), I put clear evidence of this in front of them, but nothing happens in a hurry it seems, in fact I'm yet to be convinced anything will happen at all.  Hell will have seen no fury as I will unleash if they do not get this sorted.