It sounds easy, but old habits can be tough to break. A good way to
constantly remind staff about the hands-free passing of sharps is to
add a safety zone discussion to your pre-op timeouts. The idea is to
make sure everyone knows not just the safety zone's location for that
particular case, but also to remind them to use it.
Our nurse managers and nurse practice specialists conducted
monthly audits to make sure our teams included the safety zones in
timeouts and properly ob-served them during procedures. Their
watchful eye helped promote the time out initiative and increase
compliance.
2. Use of safety-engineered devices
We assigned a team of surgical staffers to a "sharps committee,"
O C T O B E R 2 0 1 8 • O U T PA T I E N T S U R G E R Y. N E T • 1 1
Autoclavable
can be re-used for hundreds of procedures
improve sharps safety for pennies per
procedure*
can b
im
®
Neutral Zone Tray
Hands Free Technique made easy!
S e e i t i n a c t i o n : w w w. b i t . l y / s o ff z o n e
viscotcs@viscot.com • www.viscot.com • 800.221.0658
*based on 50+ uses
Enforces Hands Free Technique
recommendations from
AORN, OSHA, & ACS
