Razi Journal of Medical Sciences

  Background: Anesthesiologists, more than any other specialists, face lawsuits. As that there was no complete report on the reasons of lawsuit and condemnation of these specialists in Fars province, this study presents the results related to the frequency and reasons of lawsuit from anesthesiologists in the above province.

  Methods: This was a descriptive cross sectional study conducted on all of the dossiers on anesthesiologists condemnation referred to Shiraz Forensic Medicine commissions during 2006-2011. Collected data contained demographic characteristics of complainants, medical status of patients, types and degrees of medical faults and the final opinion of the medical commission.

  Results: Among all the studied dossiers, 35 cases were related to anesthesiologists’ complaints, most of complaints were from patients aged between 40-50 years old, 71.43% of whom were males and others (28.57%) were females. Totally, 82.86% of the cases resulted in death and 17.14% had impairment among which 50% were related to brain injury. Most important cause of death in 24.14% of cases was respiratory problems.

  Conclusion: According to the present findings, most cases of complaints from anesthesiologists were related to middle age patients without any background of illness. So lack of anesthesiology services to high risk and old patients because of the fear of medical faults is not acceptable. At the same time it is necessary to insure anesthesiologists not to be afraid of patients’ complaints.