Practitioners are upset by the National Assembly’s criticism of “poor endoscope disinfection”… “statistical illusion”

Internal medicine practitioners were upset when a member of the National Assembly pointed out that the majority of health examination institutions that do not disinfect endoscopes are at the clinic level. They argued that this was an optical illusion caused by the high proportion of clinic-level examination institutions, and that there was no significant difference in the rate of inappropriate disinfection between clinic-level and hospital-level institutions.

The Society of Gastrointestinal Endoscopy, which consists mainly of internal medicine practitioners, recently refuted the data published by People Power Party lawmaker Baek Jong-heon on ‘Medical institutions found to be inadequate in inspection of gastrointestinal and colonoscopy disinfection.’

The Society of Colon Endoscopy said, “If you look at the status of examination institutions by type in the 2022 Checkup Statistical Yearbook, there are 363 general hospitals, 1,143 hospitals, and 9,454 clinics, with the ratio of clinics at the clinic level among the examination institutions being 86%.” “In terms of ratio, there is no difference, with 6.3% at the hospital level and 7.4% at the clinic level in 24 years,” he claimed.

In addition, it was revealed that both the hospital-level inappropriate rate and the clinic-level inappropriate rate have been showing a continuous increasing trend since 2020 without much difference.

He then emphasized that the inappropriate rate of colonoscopy at the clinic level is lower than that at the hospital level, and that the increase in the inappropriate rate compared to the previous year also more than tripled from 1.4% at the hospital level to 5% in 2024.

Previously, Rep. Baek Jong-heon’s office announced that as a result of inspections related to disinfection of stomach and colonoscopes over the past five years, 593 locations, or 2.1% of the total 28,783 national health examination institutions, received inadequate results. An inappropriate decision is made when the endoscopic instruments are not cleaned or disinfected or when disposable items are reused.

By type of medical institution, it was pointed out that among all inappropriate cases related to gastrointestinal endoscope disinfection (375 cases) over the past five years, clinic-level medical institutions accounted for the highest proportion, and the proportion of clinic-level medical institutions increased from 75% in 2019 to 87% in 2023.

In addition, among cases of inappropriate disinfection of colonoscopes (218 cases), the proportion of clinic-level medical institutions was the highest, and was increasing faster than gastroscopy, from 63% in 2019 to 87% in 2023.

The Society of Colon Endoscopy said, “Because the ratio of clinic-level examination institutions is inherently high, it is an optical illusion that the (inappropriate rate) appears high,” and added, “If insufficient disinfection is found, refunds and administrative measures are taken, so most clinic-level institutions are complying with the guidelines.” “He explained. The society criticized, “It is a distortion of reality to report that 80% of inappropriate institutions are clinic-level without considering the number of clinic-level and hospital-level examination institutions.”