Effectiveness of Surgical Timeouts for Wrong-Site Surgeries

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Effectiveness in Surgical Timeouts for Wrong-Site Surgeries
Timeouts challenge the surgical team to be accurate while verifying the correct patient, procedure, site, signed consent, and any known allergies with the patient prior to going into surgery. The timeout extends into the operating room while the patient is asleep with the entire team in agreement prior to cutting. This Evidence Based project will evaluate the amount of surgical errors in reference to wrong-site surgeries utilizing timeouts.
Clinical Significance
The importance of this clinical research is to study the impact of the surgical timeout and how these errors continue to occur. The World Health Organization (2014) estimates that over 440,000 people die annually due to hospital errors and by 2015 every hospital will utilize a Surgical Safety Checklist. There are over 80,000 reported wrong-site surgical errors reported from 1995-2010. Page (2006) claims 4000 wrong-site surgeries annually in the United States, or 1 in 17,000 surgeries, the third most frequent life-threatening medical error (p 55).
The significance of hospital errors are ranked as the third leading cause of death with the majority of them being preventable errors. Surgical errors are preventable with accurate communication and the proper safety checklist in place.. Communication within the OR is imperative and all surgical personnel are required to pause for the time out to ensure that it is completed and agreed upon. Surgical errors continue to take place and further research is needed to provide accurate, detailed data as to where the problem exists.
I chose to examine the use of the timeout tool in regards to the number of wrong-site surgeries and the impact they have on the patient. It is the nu...

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...ow. Retrieved from http://www.hospitalsafetyscore.org/hospitalerrors-thirdleading-causeofdeathinus-improvementstooslow
Joint Commission. (2011). Universal protocol. Retrieved from http://www.jointcommission.org/standards_information/up.aspx.
Melnyk, B. M., & Fineout-Overholt, E. (2011). Asking compelling, clinical questions. In Fineout-Overholt, E. & Stillwell, S.B. (Eds.), Evidence-based practice in nursing & healthcare: a guide to best practice (2nd ed.,) (pp.26-33). Philadelphia: Wolters Kluwer/Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.
Page, L. (2006). System marks new method of preventing wrong-site surgery. Mater Manag Health Care, 15, 55–56.
Rydenfalt, C., Johansson, G., Odenrick, P., Akerman, K., Larsson, P. A. (2013). Compliance with the WHO surgical safety checklist: deviations and possible improvements. International Journal for Quality in Health Care, 25, 182-187.

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