Outpatient Surgery Magazine, providing current information on Surgical Services, Surgical Facility Administration, Outpatient Surgery News and Trends, OR Excellence and more.
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3 4 O R E X C E L L E N C E. C O M S U P P L E M E N T T O O U T P AT I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E O N L I N E | J U N E 2 0 1 4 must consider the possibility that a team member could be a carrier. If that hap- pens, you may need to screen staff. • Prophylactic antibiotic therapy. This can be very effective in the fight to reduce SSIs, but there are a lot of variables that need to be understood. Re-dos- ing and weight-based dosing can be especially challenging, particularly when you're dealing with obese patients. Also, it makes sense to find out whether patients are really allergic to penicillin. Avoiding antibiotics is a disservice to patients who don't have anaphylactic penicillin allergies, since alternative thera- py may be less efficacious. Also, vancomycin is often used as an alternative for cefazolin in penicillin-allergic patients, but vancomycin needs to be infused slowly, which can delay patient throughput. • Is pre-op bathing justified? The evidence supporting universal adoption is still lacking, provider practices vary greatly and there's no standard set of directions for patients. No wonder healthcare providers are confused. But there's sufficient rationale to use chlorhexidine-impregnated cloths both the night before and morning of surgery. The cloths are key because most people who use the soap immediately rinse it off. Tell patients how to use the cloths, and emphasize that they should wipe their entire bodies from the chin down, not just the surgical site, because it's easy to transfer bacteria from one location on the body to another. • How to handle loaner equipment. This is something that's easy to overlook, but you need to have a policy in place when it comes to receiving, cleaning and sterilizing loaner equipment. We've had to tell many vendors that the items we were getting from them were unacceptable. No equipment should come into your facility dirty or pose a risk for transmission of bloodborne pathogens to your sterile processing staff. Also inspect loaners' containers for cleanliness. OSM K I C K E R 1406_ORX_guide_Layout 1 5/29/14 3:23 PM Page 34