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Work-Life Balance - January 2017 - 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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"Pre-op has always been environmentally warm, and we provide a blanket as well," she says, "but we're now looking at pre-op warming versus starting intraoperatively." Although she currently uses a fluid warmer, Ms. Dill has one more item on her warming wish list for 2017: a temperature-controlled warm- ing cabinet for IV fluids. Then there's the Surgery Center of Idaho, a multispecialty facility focused primarily on urology. Patients enduring shorter procedures receive warmed cotton blankets, beginning in pre-op. The surgical team will continually monitor the patient's temperature and, if need- ed, use a "mummy wrap" to maintain normothermia, says Samantha Owens, BSN, RN, who oversees regulatory compliance and infection control for the Meridian, Idaho-based facility. Last year, the facility invested in a forced-air warming system, which was doable because the system's manufacturer provided the unit at no cost, meaning the center now has to pay only for the blankets — a cost of less than $30 each. The center uses the forced-air warming blanket for longer procedures, including vasectomy reversals and some prostate cases, which Ms. Owens says can take more than 4 hours, and the system follows the patient from the OR to the PACU. "It really depends on the length of surgery — case by case and patient by patient," she says. OSM J a n u a r y 2 0 1 7 • O U T PA T I E N TS U R G E R Y. N E T • 1 3 7

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