Outpatient Surgery Magazine

OR Excellence Awards 2015 - September 2015 - 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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regarding sedation, or whether he will be able to play golf again after- ward. Then, from the moment they arrive at the center, patients and fami- lies are pampered and attended to. "Our receptionist was born and raised here, and I think she knows half of the people in Bismarck. She greets them by name," says Ms. Radke. "Meanwhile, when other staff members see patients coming, they'll open the door, and say: 'Hi, how are you? We've been waiting for you!'" The goal is to calm jittery nerves. And in the center's friendly glow, nervousness quickly begins to melt away. "You can see it happen," says Ms. Radke. "We give them a nice warm blanket, put them in a recliner, and as they start to relax, we visit about different things. For example, if we know they just had a child go off to college, or they just got back from vacation, we always put that on their chart, so we can talk about things that are meaningful to them." The surgeon also visits with patients and families before all cases. By the time they're ready to go back to surgery, patients are often relaxed to the point that they don't need sedation, she says. Family matters Once the patient is in the capable hands of the surgical staff, the patient's family becomes a center of attention. They're invited into a viewing room, where they can watch the surgery or, if they're squeam- ish, simply have all their questions answered as it proceeds. The viewing room is staffed full-time by a "family coordinator." "She's very well-versed with what goes on with surgery," says Ms. Radke. "She serves the family cookies and coffee or juice, she shows them the lens that's going to go into the eye, and she explains what's going on. They love it." Families, she says, usually have plenty of ques- tions (including things like, "Will she be able to go bowling tonight?") 8 3 S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 5 | O U T P A T I E N T S U R G E R Y . N E T

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