Campus Location

Dallas Campus (Online)

Date of Award

6-2024

ORCID

https://orcid.org/0009-0004-2647-7859

Document Type

DNP Project

Department

Nursing

Degree Name

Doctor of Nursing Practice

Committee Chair or Primary Advisor

Dr. Sandra Cleveland

Second Committee Member or Secondary Advisor

Dr. Molly Kuhle

Third Committee Member or Committee Reader

N/A

Abstract

Abstract

Fifty million surgeries are performed annually in the United States with an estimated 5,000 patients affected by unintentionally retained surgical items (RSIs) due to errors in the operating room. Surgical items inadvertently left inside patients may include sponges, instruments, needles, or small miscellaneous parts. It is not well understood why the surgical counting process fails to prevent the incidence of unintentional RSIs. The proposed educational curriculum was intended to enhance the knowledge and self-efficacy of surgical nurses and technicians to minimize errors and eliminate RSIs. Evidence-based strategies to complement existing knowledge of unintentional RSIs were introduced through didactic and visual imagery. A standardized instrument developed by the Association of periOperative Registered Nurses to prevent RSIs in the operating room OR was adapted to measure distinct variables of project participants. Patient injuries that can result from a retained surgical item include pain, infection, inflammatory fever, abscesses, permanent scarring, septic shock, bowel injuries, deformation and disfigurement, permanent disability, loss of sensation, stroke, brain damage, and death. Annual healthcare costs associated with unintentional RSIs are $2.4 billion in the United States. Despite policy and procedure mandates by healthcare organizations, regulatory efforts, and sanctions established by state and federal governments, surgical patients continue to have retained surgical items unintentionally left in their bodies during surgery. Stakes are high as morbidity and mortality are the ultimate costs.

Keywords: retained surgical item, RSI, preventable surgical error, communication in operating room, gossypiboma, unintended retention of foreign object, radiofrequency technologies

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

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