You Can't Make This Stuff Up

The following first-person accounts are selected from about 200 such stories I received after asking anesthesiologists to share their experiences with weaponized incident reporting (asamonitor.pub/3Okyc5s). I have not verified these accounts. However, the common thread of the reports I received is that physicians often feel unfairly targeted by event reporting. There is a perception that incident reporting is used to settle scores and correct the perceived power imbalance in medicine.

I have edited the reports to ensure anonymity and focus on critical elements in the narrative.

There are many names for incident reporting systems. I've chosen to call them “SAFE reports.” That is the name used at Stanford. I like it because of the uncomfortable irony in the name, as shown in the first-person accounts below.

“I received a SAFE report as a resident for ‘rolling my eyes’ at a nurse. I don't even remember the incident. However,...