Outpatient Surgery Magazine

Salary Survey - January 2020 - Subscribe to Outpatient Surgery Magazine

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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1. It's not just needles and scalpels. When you think of sharps injuries, needlesticks and scalpel blades probably come to mind as the clear and present dangers in the OR. And for good reason. Needlesticks are the No. 1 cause of injury among operat- ing room personnel and scalpels are the second most frequent. Drill bits? They rank near the bottom of the sharps injury list, but they can injure and we've got the picture atop this page to prove it: a bit sticking straight up out of a scrub tech's gloved palm like a tiny javelin. The bit was still spinning when the surgeon whipped around to pass the drill off to the unsuspecting tech, whirring fast enough to puncture the glove and penetrate the tech's skin. "The physician probably still had his foot on the power button when he pushed the drill toward the scrub tech's hand," says Susan Angelides, MSN, BSBM, CNOR, RNFA, a perioperative services consultant based in Scottsdale, Ariz., who supplied us with the photo. 2. Sharps safety extends beyond the OR. Sharps injuries can occur when and where you least suspect them, not just with- in the confines of the OR walls, but wherever people use, dispose of, disassemble and disinfect sharps. Year after year, 1 in 4 of all sharps injuries occur downstream to the non-user, according to sharps injury incident data from the International Safety Center Exposure Prevention Information Network (EPINet). "Keep in mind that the use and activation of safety mechanisms and proper disposal protect not just the user of the device, but those who come into contact with that device throughout its lifespan," says EPINet. In sterile processing, for example, a tech can easily reach his hand into a tray and get poked by a concealed sharp. Jenny J A N U A R Y 2 0 2 0 • O U T PA T I E N T S U R G E R Y. N E T • 4 7

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