medical error disclosure

medicine had never been error free. medical society has responsibility to reduce the rate of medical errors and should respect to people and patients rights in the case of error occurrence to maintain their trust. waiver of cause of medical errors, what is of importance is recognizing the ethical duty of physician toward her patient in the case of error commitment. in this paper at the first, the medical error is defined and its causes and its prevalence in different countries are reviewed. next we will discuss normative and descriptive ethics of approach to medical error. then barriers to disclosure will be mentioned. finally important practical points in medical error disclosure and necessity of cultural changes in health systems to support disclosure and make experience and educational opportunities out of errors are discussed. according to principles of respect to autonomy and beneficence, physicians have to disclose their errors to patients. to support and courage them, a systemic approach to medical error and providing an a field free of judgment and blame are operative and necessary.