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Doctors Must Double-Check Before Surgery
Newsday ^ | June 22, 2004

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 ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: doctors; doublecheck; healthcare; operate; surgery
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1 posted on 06/24/2004 3:33:28 PM PDT by nuconvert
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To: nuconvert

Double check before surgery.
Gee, what a revolutionary innovation. What will they think of next?


2 posted on 06/24/2004 3:35:39 PM PDT by nuconvert ("America will never be intimidated by thugs and assassins." ( Azadi baraye Iran)
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To: nuconvert

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.


3 posted on 06/24/2004 3:36:14 PM PDT by OSHA (This is a loaner. My real tagline is in the shop.)
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To: OSHA

LOL!!!!!!


4 posted on 06/24/2004 3:42:27 PM PDT by Gator113
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To: OSHA

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.


5 posted on 06/24/2004 3:44:31 PM PDT by nuconvert ("America will never be intimidated by thugs and assassins." ( Azadi baraye Iran)
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To: OSHA
On my last two knee surgeries the nurse marked the correct knee before. I was asked at least two times after that if the correct knee had been marked.

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.

6 posted on 06/24/2004 3:45:35 PM PDT by Spyder (An Army wife)
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To: nuconvert

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-)


7 posted on 06/24/2004 3:47:20 PM PDT by Nowhere Man ("Laws are the spider webs through which the big bugs fly past and the little ones get caught.")
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To: nuconvert

Already standard operating proceedure for most qualified carpenters....

Measure twice, cut once!


8 posted on 06/24/2004 3:50:13 PM PDT by spoiler2
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To: nuconvert
He/She is on the table so he/she must be the right one.

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

9 posted on 06/24/2004 4:34:14 PM PDT by Servant of the 9 (Screwing the Inscrutable or is it Scruting the Inscrewable?)
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To: OSHA
just had knee arthoscopy yesterday. The Dr. initialed the knee he was going to do surgery on. Made me feel like I was branded.....

But, everyone who came buy (other DRs, the anethesist, the PA, nurses) everyone double checked my ID bracelet and asked what I was going to have done.

Turned out great - -
10 posted on 06/24/2004 4:41:46 PM PDT by duckbutt ( I Haven't Lost My Mind, It's Backed Up On Disk Somewhere)
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To: nuconvert

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!


11 posted on 06/24/2004 4:48:48 PM PDT by FrogMom
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To: nuconvert

I mark many of my patients slated for surgery with a sharpie in the ears. Yup, it can happen to veterinarians too.


12 posted on 06/24/2004 5:22:19 PM PDT by vetvetdoug
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To: nuconvert

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.


13 posted on 06/24/2004 5:46:23 PM PDT by Irene Adler
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To: nuconvert

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...'


14 posted on 06/24/2004 5:47:58 PM PDT by Keith in Iowa (Michael Moore is to movies as Dr. Josef Mengele was to medicine.)
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To: nuconvert

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.


15 posted on 06/24/2004 6:13:31 PM PDT by KosmicKitty (Well... There you go again!)
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To: vetvetdoug

lol


16 posted on 06/24/2004 6:38:07 PM PDT by nuconvert ("America will never be intimidated by thugs and assassins." ( Azadi baraye Iran)
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To: FrogMom

Yikes. You were almost another statistic.


17 posted on 06/24/2004 6:40:23 PM PDT by nuconvert ("America will never be intimidated by thugs and assassins." ( Azadi baraye Iran)
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To: Irene Adler
Radiographs are supposed to be marked with a left or right marker when they are taken, not afterwords. Any radiograph taken without the marker, name, date and Dr. is discarded as if it were never taken. However, in an emergency some of this is dispensed with but are useful for immediate use. Things happen for the worse sometimes but medicine is an art mixed with science. Sometimes it is more art and experience than science.
18 posted on 06/24/2004 7:09:30 PM PDT by vetvetdoug
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To: Spyder
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.

He lost in court, though. The judge said he didn't have a leg to stand on.

19 posted on 06/24/2004 7:58:58 PM PDT by TankerKC (R.I.P. Spc Trevor A. Win'E American Hero)
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To: Irene Adler

Yes, the x-rays at our facility have either a "L" or "R" on them.


20 posted on 06/24/2004 8:17:16 PM PDT by Born Conservative ("Nothing wrong with shooting as long as the right people get shot" - Dirty Harry)
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