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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need without having to comply with a complicated regimen, says Tracy A. Rhodes, RN, BSN, director of nursing at The Eye Center of North Florida in Panama City. "The hardest part of surgery was get- ting patients to comply with their drop schedule," she says. "Some take diligent notes but still get confused, others just shrug it off as too complicated." Typically patients receive 3 drops post-operatively: an anti-inflamma- tory, a steroid and an antibiotic. "An average patient would get a mini- mum of 3 antibiotic drops, 3 anti-inflammatory drops and 4 steroid drops per day," says Ms. Rhodes. "The antibiotic drops would end after a week, the anti-inflammatory continued for 3 weeks, and the steroids tapered off. That's an incredible amount of stuff to keep up with. And keep in mind that we typically would do the other eye after 2 weeks, so the process would overlap. Patients didn't know what to do." Instead, in dropless surgery, surgeons inject a solution containing the medications patients need post-operatively into the eye's anterior chamber before closing, eliminating the need for post-op drops. While some claim it reduces the risk of infection, evidence is limited due to cataract surgery's already-low infection rate, says Ms. Rhodes. Rather, the biggest benefit is improved patient compliance. "Anytime compli- ance is higher, the surgeons will be more satisfied," she says, "and so will the patients." Fewer drops, happier patients While most patients don't receive drops after the dropless procedure, there can be times when it's necessary, says Bret L. Fisher, MD, med- ical director of the Eye Center of North Florida. "The vast majority of our patients are completely dropless," he says. "Some patients who are at increased risk of macular edema — or if they had it, it would be 1 2 8 • O U T PA T I E N T S U R G E R Y M A G A Z I N E • F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 6