The Physician-Patient Alliance for Health & Safety offers a complimentary poster featuring eight strategies to improve perioperative patient safety.
The "First National Survey of Patient–Controlled Analgesia Practices: Results and Implications for Standards, Nursing Assessment and Patient Safety" outlines key steps for perioperative nurses to help ensure patient safety, especially managing and monitoring patients receiving opioids.
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Here are PPAHS' eight recommended strategies.
1. Continually assess clinical risk factors in the preoperative area.
2. Individualize alarm parameters for each patient, and ensure continuous electronic monitoring is being used.
3. When transitioning from the operating room to the post-anesthesia care unit and from the PACU to the general floor, thoroughly complete hand-off communication, assessing and reassessing patient risks.
4. Verify hand-off and care transitions, and double check continuous electronic monitoring is in place.
5. Double check patient-controlled analgesia dosing, pump parameters and monitor settings.
6. Identify time markers to reassess patient risk factors.
7. In postoperative orders, identify lead changes to help reduce nuisance alarms.
8. Continuously monitor patients oxygen levels and CO2 levels until a complete assessment has determined no evident signs of respiratory compromise.
Click here to download the poster for use in your facility
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More Articles on Perioperative Strategy:
Session at Becker's ASC Meeting: "Creating a Best in Class Perioperative Service Line"
Perioperative Nurse Education and the Future of Value-Based Care
5 Considerations for Improving Perioperative Management