Posted on 06/24/2004 3:33:26 PM PDT by nuconvert
Doctors Must Double-Check Before Surgery
By LAURAN NEERGAARD
AP Medical Writer
June 22, 2004, 9:52 PM EDT
WASHINGTON -- Starting July 1, operating rooms are supposed to be a little safer: Surgical teams must take new steps to prevent operating on the wrong body part or wrong patient.
Among the requirements: Much as airline pilots go through a safety checklist before takeoff, surgeons and nurses must take what's being dubbed a "time-out" before cutting. It's to double-check that the right patient is on the table, if he's really to lose a kidney and not a gallbladder -- and if so, on which side.
Hospital regulators hope the new rules will finally put an end to growing reports of wrong-site, wrong-procedure and wrong-patient surgeries.
"These should never happen," says Dr. Dennis O'Leary, who heads the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations. The agency can revoke the accreditation of hospital or other surgical sites that don't comply with the new safety steps.
This isn't wrong surgery because of a misdiagnosis, but mixups inside the operating room. In one infamous 1995 case a doctor amputated Willie King's wrong foot; indeed, the mixups are thought to be most frequent in orthopedic surgery.
But reports range the gamut from removing the wrong organ to drilling into the wrong side of a patient's skull to a recent case where the wrong patient was given a heart catheterization.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsday.com ...
Double check before surgery.
Gee, what a revolutionary innovation. What will they think of next?
My wife recently had knee surgery. When she came home I found "YES" written in ink in the leg that was to be operated on. I got some mileage outta that ubetcha.
LOL!!!!!!
The sad thing is, it's been suggested for years that patients do this themselves. I suppose if it wasn't costing the insurance companies more money, (and the hospitals), few would really care.
BTW, on that case with the "wrong leg amputated," I read recently that the guy had vascular disease so bad that he actually was scheduled for the "wrong leg" to be amputed at a later date. Course the lawyers got to him first.
I know when I had my left hand operated on for infection last year, before the operation, I do remember the surgeon marking an "X" on my left wrist, I asked him why as I was wheeled into the OR and he told me, "to make sure I operate on the correct hand." I figure, well, if it helps.... B-)
Already standard operating proceedure for most qualified carpenters....
Measure twice, cut once!
Add a little dyslexia and mirror image problems to the arrogance of a surgeon and it's a miracle they ever get it right.
So9
When I had a bone spur removed and tendon damage repaired in my shoulder, they did a pre-op check in.
The nurse briefing us said what they were going to do to my left shoulder. I said, "NO, my RIGHT shoulder." She looked at me and looked at her papers and said, "No, your left shoulder." I said, "I'm going home, I'm not wearing this sling on the right for nothing!" She was finally convinced and changed a bunch of papers. We went out to wait for an hour for the operating room to be free.
They finally came and got me and they walked me into the OR. They were very obviously setting the operating table up to operate on my left shoulder. I stopped cold and announced, in a loud voice, "Attention everyone!" When everyone had turned and looked at me, I said, "This surgery is on my RIGHT shoulder, NOT my left!" A couple of them scrambled for papers and looked at me, the papers and then back at me, whispering the whole time. They then moved an extension from the left side of the table to the right.
A couple of years later when the same hospital operated on my foot, I made the pre-op people write "WRONG FOOT" on the other foot.
Sheesh!
I mark many of my patients slated for surgery with a sharpie in the ears. Yup, it can happen to veterinarians too.
I believe that one reason for wrong-side surgeries is that ex-rays can get flipped. I believe that x-rays are often marked for right or left these days so that that is less likely to happen. Perhaps medical personnel on this thread would like to confirm or disconfirm this.
When I got my hernia fixed, they kept me awake long enough to tell the OR team why I was on the table...then it was 'sleepy time...'
My best friend had a breast reduction done 5 years ago. She had to be marked before the surgery while she was standng up. (We all know how things can change when we lay down ;-) )
She was also photographed & got to keep one of them which she snuck into a pile of vacation photos. Blew alot of our minds when you're expecting scenery and you get the map of where the nipples are going to be place. I never knew it before her surgery, but the doctor actually cuts all around the nipples, slits the breast tissue and just moves them up and sews them in place.
lol
Yikes. You were almost another statistic.
He lost in court, though. The judge said he didn't have a leg to stand on.
Yes, the x-rays at our facility have either a "L" or "R" on them.
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