ASSESSMENT OF THE AWARENESS OF MEDICAL LITIGATION AMONG RADIOGRAPHERS IN THE SOUTH EASTERN NIGERIA

Litigation in the practice of medical radiography is an area that calls for much attention. There has been a surge in the number of litigious cases against medical practitioners and the field of medical radiography is not spared in the trend. There has really been little to no research done on litigation in the field of radiography especially in the south east, hence the need for this study. The aim of this study was to assess radiographers’ awareness of medical litigation, determine if any correlation exists between rank of radiographers and medical litigation, gender of the radiographers and medical litigation and to assess measures that can be put in place to reduce medical litigation among practicing radiographers. A prospective cross-sectional study of 154 radiographers practicing in government and private owned hospitals in South Eastern Nigeria was carried out, with a demographic characteristic comprising of 69 males (44.8%) and 85 females (55.2%) and 133 (86.4%) intern/corps members, 13 (8.4%) basic radiographers, 5 (3.2%) senior/principal radiographers, 3 (1.9%) assistant chief/chief radiographers. A semi-structured questionnaire comprising 3 sections was used to collect data and analysis was done using SPSS version 23.0. Majority of the radiographers showed awareness of litigation either as undergraduates or in the course of practice. Although the awareness of medical litigation was good, majority of the radiographers seem not to have experienced litigation. Finally, there was statistically significance between rank of radiographer and awareness of medical litigation and there existed no statistically significance between gender of radiographer and the awareness of medical litigation. Obtaining consent, explaining procedure to patient and proper documentation and diagnosis are major ways of preventing litigation in practice and majority agreed that a course called medical litigation should be introduced into the undergraduate curriculum.