Surgical Safety Checklist (SSCL)
Patient safety remains the most important priority for
St. Thomas Elgin General Hospital and this involves ensuring a safe experience
for patients who undergo surgery here. Our patients can expect safe, high
quality care, and one tool used to help ensure a positive patient care
experience is a surgical safety checklist.
What is a Surgical Safety Checklist?
A Surgical Safety Checklist (SSCL) is a patient safety
communication tool that is used by a team of operating room professionals
(nurses, surgeons, anesthesiologists, and others) to discuss important details
about each surgical case. In many ways, the surgical checklist is similar to an
airline pilot’s checklist used just before take-off. It is a final check prior
to surgery used to make sure everyone knows the important medical information
they need to know about the patient, all equipment is available and in working
order, and everyone is ready to proceed.
Operating room teams have used different types of
checklists for many years. The three-phase SSCL has emerged as a useful best
practice because it organizes the information at the right moments in time. It
is a team communication tool used to inform all team members about important
details regarding the patient and the surgery. It reduces reliance on memory so
that one person is not responsible for remembering every single step needed for
a safe surgery.
What information is included in a surgical safety
checklist?
Some examples of items contained in the checklist:
•
Verify with patient name and procedure to be done
• Allergy Check
• Medications Check
• Operation site, side and procedure
• Lab tests, xrays
The "Time Out" Phase:
• Patient position
• Operation site and side and procedure
• Antibiotics check
The Debriefing Phase:
•
Surgeon reviews important items
• Anesthesiologist reviews important items
• Nurse reviews correct counts
Will a surgical safety checklist be used on me?
If you undergo a surgery at STEGH, you can expect that
the surgical safety checklist will be used as part of the procedure. It will be
used by your health care team before, during and after your surgery to help the
health care team familiarize themselves with your medical history and any
special requirements that may be needed for your individual case.
If you have any questions about the information below
please contact us.
Surgical Safety Checklist Compliance as reported to
the Ministry
| |
April-June 2010
|
July-Dec
2010 |
January-June
2011 |
|
Percentage compliance where all three phases
(i.e., briefing, time-out and debriefing) of the SSCL were performed for
all surgical procedures in that period.
|
99.30% |
99.8% |
100% |
The percent compliance is calculated as follows:
# of times all three phases of the surgical safety
checklist was performed
x 100
= % compliance
Total Surgeries
The surgical safety checklist is considered
"performed" when the designated checklist coordinator confirms that surgical
team members have implemented and/or addressed all of the necessary tasks and
items in each of the three phases: Briefing; Time Out; and Debriefing.
Therefore, the SSCL compliance indicator is a process measure, measuring the
degree to which all three phases of the SSCL was performed correctly and
appropriately for each surgical patient.
The public reporting of our hospital’s SSCL percentage
compliance allows hospitals to establish a baseline from which they can track
their percentage compliance over time.