Not knowing what happens to patients is a problem, I think. You will never know if you did the right thing. Ours is a fairly small hospital, but because of electronic patient files, no-one can check for us because they have to give their name and they are not allowed to look at files of patients not directly under their care. So patient confidentiality prevents us from learning. Even if you happen to find the doctor who treated the patient, they are not likely to remember, or even want to talk about it for the same reason. I've even had midwives who wouldn't tell me if the patient gave birth to a boy or a girl ten minutes after we arrived at the hospital. Visitors in hospitals and care homes are even encouraged not to tell anybody what they see or hear as "staff may be accused of breaking patient confidentiality". All this while the one person (the patient) who doesn't have to worry about this, tells every lovely detail to every person he knows the very moment it happens.