The 15th annual National Time Out Day is approaching, and The Joint Commission and the Association of periOperative Registered Nurses want surgical care teams to remember the importance of presurgical checks.
What you should know:
1. National Time Out Day is June 15.
2. Despite the awareness day existing for 15 years, wrong-site surgeries are still among the three most frequent adverse event.
3. The Joint Commission's associate director of high reliability initiatives, LuAnn Vis, BSN, RN, said organizations need to be vigilant to decrease the number of wrong-site surgeries they perform.
4. She urged organizations to hold every perioperative team member equally accountable.
5. She recommended five ways to protect patients from wrong-site surgeries:
- Understand the risks that lead to wrong-site surgeries
- Give the patient an active role in the time out
- Give every member a role in the time out
- Track your time-out success and improvement areas
- Build an accountability culture