Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Surgical Teams Reminded To Ensure Patient Safety

Encourage surgical teams in the take time out before each operation to confirm correct patient, correct procedure, correct surgical site, and other important information to ensure patient safety, the Association of Perioperative Nurses (AORN) in partnership with the Council on Surgical and Perioperative Safety (CSR) and the Joint Commission to recognize National Time Out Day on June 18.
AORN began sponsoring National Time Out Day in 2004 to raise awareness about the importance of requiring the entire surgical team - including physicians, nurses and surgical technologists - to pause (take time out) before all invasive procedures to communicate as a group and confirm key information about the patient and the procedure to help prevent errors.
The Joint Commission requires all accredited health care facilities in practice the time-out as part of its Universal Protocol for preventing wrong site, wrong procedure, wrong person surgery. "Despite the widespread adoption of health workers to take time out, surgical errors, wrong site surgery as still frequently reported in the United States and many perioperative professionals report the lack of a coherent approach to the universal protocol and participation of all relevant members of the team or," said Peter B. Angood, MD, vice president and general manager for Patient Safety Joint Commission.
"Just like a sports team huddles before the game to determine their game plan, or the team should take time out before the procedure for review purposes, patient information, equipment readiness, supply availability and roles and responsibilities of each team member, said Jeffrey Beutler, CRNA, MS, executive director of the American Association Nurse Anesthetists (Aana) and Chairman of the Council on Surgical and Perioperative Safety (CSR). "surgical procedures are performed under general anesthesia to be associated with a high level of intensity of care for any medical practice and require the joint efforts of the team many highly qualified individuals to be successful. Taking time out, members of the perioperative team pause for us to do all that is needed to ensure that our patients have a high probability of experiencing the best results. "
CSR is a multidisciplinary coalition of professional organizations whose members are involved in the practical care of surgical patients, including Aana, AORN, the American College of Surgeons, American Association of Surgical Assistants Physicians, American Society of Anesthesiologists, the Association of Surgical Technologists and the American Society of PeriAnesthesia Nurses.
"By partnering with AORN on National Time Out Day and the Joint Commission of each organization, CGS members demonstrate their commitment to perioperative collaboration we hope to all or a team," said AORN Executive Director Linda Groah, RN, MSN, CNOR, CNAA, FAAN . Groah encourages perioperative professionals to recognize National Time Out Day to remind each member of the surgical team, is it important to take time out for patient safety.

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