BACKGROUND Team-based group communications using checklists are widely advocated to achieve shared understandings and improve patient safety. Despite the positive effect checklists have on collaborations and reduced postoperative complications, their use has not been straightforward. Previous research has described contextual factors that impact on the implementation of checklists, however ther...

OBJECTIVES/HYPOTHESIS To assess the efficacy of a surgical telementoring program for endoscopic skull base surgery. STUDY DESIGN Prospective case series with surveys of surgeons. METHODS A surgical telementoring program was established for mentoring of a skull base team at the University of Maribor in Slovenia by an experienced skull base team at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center ...

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the influence of the surgical team (general surgery or thoracic surgery) and the surgical technique (with or without isthmectomy) on the incidence of postintubation injuries in the airways of tracheostomized patients. METHODS Between January 1st and August 31st, 2007, 164 patients admitted to the adult intensive care unit and tracheally intubated for more than 24 h were ...

BACKGROUND The invasive nature of surgery, with its increased exposure to blood, means that during surgery there is a high risk of transfer of pathogens. Pathogens can be transferred through contact between surgical patients and the surgical team, resulting in post-operative or blood borne infections in patients or blood borne infections in the surgical team. Both patients and the surgical team...

In a field trial of three disinfectant-detergent preparations for the surgical scrub Hibiscrub (a 4% chlorhexidine detergent solution) maintained a significantly greater residual antibacterial action on the skin of the gloved hands of an operating team than was obtained with Disadine (povidone-iodine detergent preparation) (P<0.001). In comparison with Phisohex (3% hexachlorophane in detergent ...

This article focuses on key aspects of the "nontraditional" surgical subjects of organizational structure and team interaction. First, the deficiencies in team dynamics found within the modern operating room (OR) and their resultant consequences are highlighted. Next, essential human factors concepts related to error generation, organizational culture, high reliability, and team science as appl...

Demographic Trends NEARLY half the patients admitted to general wards of hospitals today are over the age of 60 (Lancet, I963); the average age of patients admitted to Geriatric Units varies between 75 and 80, and in the Sunderland Geriatric Unit over onethird of all the admissions are over 80 years. The number of operations performed on patients of 60 and over (excluding orthopaedic and urolog...

The operating theatre is a very complex environment shared, for a certain period, by a group of people having highly different needs: on one side, there is the surgical team that must carry out a demanding job that in some cases can be very stressful (e.g. orthopedics surgery or those lasting more than four hours) and on the other, there is the anesthetized patient often subject to liquid infus...

background: nursing project management is widely used in different aspects of the society. however, whether the nursing project management can control the infections in the operation room (or) is rarely reported. we evaluated the outcomes of surgical patients after implementing a nursing project management program to provide new scientific ways to manage the or infections. methods: overall, 382...