10 • O
U T P A T I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E • O C T O B E R 2 0 2 0
NO TIME TO WASTE
Streamline the Search for Missing Instruments
Ideas Work
That
M
arking trash bags with an OR's room num-
ber is a simple way to shorten the search
for misplaced instruments. No matter how
many instrument counts take place or how vigilant a
surgical team might be, tools can get misplaced — or
accidently thrown away. If we get a call from sterile
processing about a missing instrument, the last thing
anyone wants to do is search through multiple trash
bags to look for it. To minimize the rummaging, we
write OR room numbers on trash bags. That way,
we'll only have to look through the bags from individ-
ual rooms when searching for an instrument that
went missing during a specific case.
Carol Gentry, MSN, RN
Johns Hopkins Hospital
Baltimore
cgentry1@sjmi.edu
NARROWING THE SEARCH Staff at Johns Hopkins Hospital number trash bags in
each OR.
Carol
Gentry,
MSN,
RN
D
o you ever notice how your fresh stock of facility-
logoed pens always seem to disappear? If you don't
want to lecture staff about "stealing" your dwindling
supplies, try this counterintuitive approach: Hold a competi-
tion and reward the most prolific pilferer. Simply ask every-
one to bring in their collection, place them on a piece of paper
with their name and the number of returned pens on it, and
reward the person who stockpiled the most. We held our first
pen thief competition recently, and it was a rousing success.
Staff got a kick out of the irreverent competition and the win-
ner walked away with a small prize — as well as a great story.
Victoria Wiltshire, MBA, RN
SightTrust Eye Institute
Sunrise, Fla.
vwiltshire@sighttrust.com
SUPPLY-SAVER
Why We Reward Pen Thieves
THE COMPANY'S INK Staff at SightTrust Eye Institute submitted photos of the company pens they managed
to collect as part of a fun, light-hearted competition.
Victoria
Wiltshire,
MBA,
RN