Reports of medical errors are now processed and issued significantly faster to support judicial authorities, it has been revealed.
The National Health Regulatory Authority (NHRA) yesterday announced that it has upgraded its system for issuing reports prepared by specialised medical committees as part of wider government efforts to enhance service quality and streamline procedures.
These reports are often required by judicial bodies when handling cases related to medical errors.
“Under the streamlined service, the completion period (for reports) has been reduced from 115 days to 25 days, in addition to cutting the number of approvals required to obtain the service,” the NHRA said in a statement.
“This will facilitate the investigation process in cases referred by judicial authorities – starting from the issuance and approval of the final decision by the disciplinary committees for health professions, followed by the submission of the final report to the competent judicial authority to decide on the relevant procedures in medical error cases.”
Chief executive Dr Ahmed Al Ansari highlighted NHRA’s adoption of innovative solutions in line with the highest standards of quality and efficiency.
“The launch of the service demonstrates the authority’s commitment to improving its services, reducing time and effort for relevant institutions, and enhancing the efficiency of work and regulatory procedures,” he said.
More than 1,300 government services have also been documented, translated and published, with around 800 having undergone development and re-engineering across various sectors.
This was based on proposals and feedback received on government services through the National System for Proposals and Complaints (Tawasul), investors’ feedback, and mystery shopper reports for evaluating government services, in addition to the launch of guideline manuals and service level agreements.
Health Minister Dr Jalila Al Sayyed in November said that 56 individuals were found practising health-related professions without valid licences, while eight premises were illegally offering medical or cosmetic services, despite not being registered as clinics.
The revelations came in the government’s official response to a parliamentary question submitted by Strategic Thinking Bloc member MP Ali Al Dossary, who sought detailed figures on illegal medical operators, the risks they posed and how they managed to operate in the kingdom.
The minister last May, in a written reply to Shura Council members, said that according to NHRA data, there were zero cases of medical errors recorded in 2024 across all public hospitals, including Salmaniya Medical Complex, and primary health centres.
She said this marked a sharp decline from 2023, when seven medical errors were documented in public hospitals.
Notably, no errors were recorded in primary healthcare centres for both 2023 and 2024, underscoring the reliability of frontline medical services in the kingdom.
The number of reported medical errors across private healthcare institutions declined from 17 in 2023 to 12 in 2024 – a 29.4pc reduction.
Specifically, private hospitals reported four medical errors in 2023 and only one in 2024.
The minister added the medical errors spanned five specialties: emergency medicine, urology surgery, nephrology, family/general medicine and dentistry.
Dentistry stood out as the most error-prone field in the private sector, accounting for 11 of the 13 incidents in 2023 and five of the 11 in 2024.
The GDN reported in November 2024 that a total of BD100,000 was paid as compensations for medical errors since December 2022.
A pie chart shows the distribution of complaints, incidents and lawsuits in the public and private health care facilities registered in 2023 by the NHRA
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