3. Being better prepared. Our clinical coordinators for each spe-
cialty now work farther ahead on the schedule — a week or more
ahead as opposed to 1 or 2 days ahead. We're a level-2 trauma center
and our ORs are busy with a lot of surgeries, both inpatient and out-
patient, so it has been an adjustment, but being better prepared has
given us a valuable cushion. We have ample time to procure the
instruments and equipment needed for each case, which diminishes
the "rush factor" in central sterile.
We have also standardized how we sterilize instrumentation coming
from outside our facility. Now, if we "borrow" instrumentation from
another location in our health system or the instrumentation comes in
from a vendor, we schedule it for sterilization in central sterile pro-
cessing, not IUSS in the OR.
OSM
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