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Receiving and giving oneself formative feedback is essential to professionals’ development of reflective attitudes towards their practices. In the healthcare professions, debriefing sessions are often used to provide feedback. Such sessions often incorporate videos to support the debriefing process. However, this usually occurs with reference to simulations and not to actual practice; furthermore, the potential of using video-annotation software to analyse practice has not been fully exploited in nursing education. To explore this still under-investigated potential, the current pilot study was conducted in the domain of operation room technicians to investigate whether the use of videos of actual practice and video-annotation software affected the quality of feedback given during the debriefing sessions. The pilot experience seems to confirm that this approach is feasible in actual practice. More particularly, the results suggest that video support enables more supportive feedback about work processes and more evidence- and situation-based feedback than regular debriefing without video. The use of video annotation also tends to support more student-driven and dialogical feedback as well as tending to increase student acceptance of feedback. Additional research is needed to further investigate the feasibility of this approach within hospitals. •Video-recording operating room technicians during real practice is feasible.•Video-annotation to support formative feedback is feasible.•Video support enables process-oriented and evidence-based feedback.•Video-annotation tends to support student-driven and dialogical feedback.•Video-annotation tends to increase the student's acceptance of feedback.

The purpose of this study was to examine the outcomes of checklist-driven preoperative briefings and postoperative debriefings during the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) medical team training program. A briefing score (1, never started; 2, started then discontinued; 3, maintained on original targeted cases; 4, expanded to other services; 5, briefing all cases, all services) was established at 10.1 ± .3 months after introduction of the checklist. Outcomes included antibiotic and deep venous thrombosis prophylaxis compliance rates before and after use of the checklist. Antibiotic (97.0% ± .1% vs 92.1% ± 1.5%; P = .01) and deep venous thrombosis (95.7% ± .8% vs 85.1% ± 4.6%; P = .05) prophylaxis compliance rates were higher after initiation of a surgical checklist. Checklist-driven preoperative briefings and postoperative debriefings are associated with improvements in patient safety for surgical patients.

Background: High-performing and high-reliability teams are an important component of service delivery. With a focused emphasis on safety in acute care hospitals, understanding the nature of surgical teams and team performance is an essential component to achieving high-quality surgical care. More information is needed about the challenges to effective team functioning in the operating room, the influence of working conditions, and the environmental context on surgical team performance. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to describe the nature of surgical teams and how they perform in the operating room to contribute to a broader knowledge about high-performing and high-reliability teams in health care settings. Methodology/Approach: We conducted a qualitative study involving direct observation and semistructured interviews. Field observations of 10 high-complexity surgeries and face-to-face interviews with 26 members of surgical teams were completed at one university medical center. A conceptual framework derived from the literature was developed to guide the selection of surgeries and surgical teams to be observed. Data were transcribed and analyzed to identify the factors and different conditions that influence the performance of these surgical teams. Findings: The type of coordination and the degree of independent and interdependent coordination vary among the seven observed stages of the surgical process. Most of the surgical teams were ad hoc teams and as such, further challenged by consistently frequent \"hand-offs\" for break relief. Additional role demands influence the situational dynamics which can alter the adaptive capacity of the team. Practice Implications: The surgical event evokes a changing degree of coordination and adaptation to complexity and uncertainty. In such environments, relational coordination through leadership can contribute to a successful surgical result, improvement of the overall process, including error reduction, and enhanced knowledge creation and dissemination, particularly germane in research university teaching hospitals.

We investigated the impact of repetitive training using high-fidelity simulation (HFS) at the point of care on the teamwork attitudes of operating room (OR) personnel. Members of the general surgical OR teams at an academic medical center participated in two half-day point-of-care HFS team training sessions. Module 1 targeted teamwork competencies; Module 2 included a preoperative briefing strategy. Modules were separated by 1 month. For each training, participants completed pre- and postsession questionnaires that included a 15-item self-efficacy tool targeting teamwork competencies using a 6-point Likert-type scale. Pre- and postsession mean scores were compared with a t test. Matched pre- and postsessions questionnaires were collected from 38 and 39 participants for Module 1 and Module 2, respectively. Mean item improvement from pre- to posttraining was 0.43 units (range, 0.23 to 0.69 units) for Module 1 and 0.42 units (range, 0.15 to 0.53 units) for Module 2. After Bonferroni adjustment, statistically significant improvement in scores from pre- to posttraining increased from four items after Module 1 to nine items after Module 2. Repetitive training of interdisciplinary OR teams through HFS at the point of care increases the effectiveness of promoting attitudinal change toward team-based competencies among participants.

An estimated 550 to 650 surgical fires occur annually in the United States. Surgical fires may have severe consequences, including burns, disfigurement, long-term medical care, or death. This article introduces a potential certification program for the prevention of surgical fires. A pilot study was conducted with a convenience sample of 10 anesthesia providers who participated in the education module. The overall objective was to educate surgical team members and to prepare them to become certified in surgical fire prevention. On completion of the education module, participants completed the 50-question certification examination. The mean pretest score was 66%; none of the participants had enough correct responses (85%) to be considered competent in surgical fire prevention. The mean post- test score was 92.80%, with all participants answering at least 85% of questions correct. A paired-samples t test showed a statistically significant increase in knowledge: t (df = 9) = 11.40; P = .001. Results of the pilot study indicate that this course can remediate gaps in knowledge of surgical fire prevention for providers. Their poor performance on the pretest suggests that many providers may not receive sufficient instruction in surgical fire prevention.

The anesthesia profession has produced voluminous research data on equipment and techniques leading to safer practices, but the lack of attention given to the inconspicuous role of anesthesia support personnel on the anesthesia care team may pose a risk to patient safety. It is questionable whether the skills of anesthesia support personnel who are trained on the job have kept up with an increasingly complex healthcare environment. Medical technology and demand for high-quality care will continue to escalate; patient safety will remain a top priority. Therefore, a definitive strategy to mitigate risk and ensure patient safety begins with strengthening the infrastructure of the anesthesia team. Formal education and certification may ensure that skill sets of anesthesia support personnel will uniformly advance with technology and standards of patient care.

Anaesthetic technicians play a key role in the operating room, yet little is known about their levels of job satisfaction or workplace stress. A blinded, confidential single mail-out survey was posted to anaesthetic technicians in New Zealand. The survey consisted of demographic information, a job satisfaction survey, the Maslach Burnout Inventory and the Short Form 12. At total of 154 forms were returned (51% response rate). Respondents worked predominantly in public hospitals and many had duties outside the operating room. Job satisfaction was related to teamwork, practical nature of work and patient contact, while dissatisfaction was related to lack of respect from nurses and limited career pathway. High to moderate levels of emotional exhaustion (48%), depersonalisation (39%) and low levels of personal accomplishment (58%) were indicators of burnout. The Short Form 12 revealed high levels of physical impairment in 24% and emotional impairment in 35% of respondents. These data suggest that work is needed to evaluate anaesthetic assistants’ job structure and actively manage their important physical and emotional sequelae.

Spry offers her perspective on making a bachelor's degree the requirement for entry into the practice of nursing, based on an informal survey she took. In answer to the question about what they considered the greatest challenges to the nursing profession and what actions were being taken to address them, respondents submitted a variety of comments. Concerns included implementing standards, achieving competencies, nurse salaries, working conditions, and recruiting new nurses to the profession.

The surgical technology profession evolved during World War I, World War II, and the Korean War -- conflicts that occurred in a relatively short span of time, contributing to a nursing shortage. The need for additional personnel, who could perform the first scrub role in assisting the surgeon, grew rapidly. More than a list of courses required for degree/ program completion, a curriculum is the sum of all student activities and learning opportunities for which the school, program, and educator assume responsibility. The \"core curriculum\" is a component of the curriculum and provides the subject areas and learning objectives that the profession has deemed as entry-level knowledge. A primary challenge when developing or revising a core curriculum is determining what knowledge a graduate will need in order to perform the entry-level role and duties of a professional. The Association of Surgical Technologists started by assembling a mix of practitioners and educators, with varying degrees of experience, to develop a comprehensive task list of the entry-level knowledge and skills a graduate should possess.