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Table 2 Key risk elements for a patient surgical checklist

From: Patients’ and healthcare workers’ recommendations for a surgical patient safety checklist – a qualitative study

CATEGORIES

SUB-CATEGORY

CODES

EXAMPLE

Pre-operative information

Contact

Direct phone number

Ask questions

Clarify information

Write down information

Nurse; “That they have a number they can ring when they get back to them self after being informed about the surgery. Maybe it could be written a place that they get proper information under admission. I believe 90% of the patients do not remember anything.

Patient; “Before the operation I had no idea who to contact. I got referred here and there and suddenly I got a letter informing me about an operation”.

Medication safety

Lack of medication lists

Updated medication list at general practitioners office

Little insight in own medication

Identify anticoagulants with their general practitioners

Learn their medications

Surgeon; “I don’t believe we always ask if they use anticoagulants and they don’t always understand that it is anticoagulants they are using. Patients often relate to the medication name and misunderstandings can often happen”.

Patient; “I wonder what kind of information the nurses have. When I came to the ward after my surgery, I was offered some pain relief and I am allergic to certain medications. Luckily I asked her because I did not recognise those tablets and asked what they were and it turned out I was allergic to them”.

Health status

Ensure correct treatment

Diabetes

High blood pressure

Cardio-Vascular disease

Chronic diseases

Non Healing wounds

Regular control at the general practitioners office

Test for multi resistance bacteria

Nurse; “I am thinking about our own health. Say, that someone is overweight; they might have diabetes that are not under control. That the general practitioners consider these things before the patients comes in for an operation.”

Nurse; “We have talked a lot about it in our ward. I believe it is very important because some patients come in a such a bad state. So I think the elective patients should consider own health and the general practitioners should be involved earlier and help them”.

Optimizing health

Patients responsibility

Contact with general practitioner

Inform patients

Exercise

Stop smoking

Stop drinking/drugs

Nutritional status

Surgeon; “We know that it’s documented that if you quit smoking the chances of complications reduce, but there is now culture for informing patients about it.

Nurse; “Most patients sit down in a chair and stay there, when they get informed about their surgery. I wish they could contact their general practitioner and ask how much activity they can have before surgery so they do not become passive. Because the whole thing is to optimize the patient health to prevent complications”.

Dental status

Regular dental checks

Recommend to check dental status

Poor dental status

Infections due to dental status

Extraction of teeth day before surgery

Surgeon; “I remember we had a patient who had to remove half of her teeth before we could operate. I believe people don’t understand how important it is that their teeth are well kept”.

Surgeon; “one patient had an old rote canal and at the bottom of the tooth there was a little thing that they had not manage to remove. He had to go to a specialist and it was not possible to get it done the week before the surgery”.

Read information

Patient need for encouragement

Accurate information

Don’t use google

Nurse; “I know there is a lot of the patients who don’t read the information given to them”

Patient; “When you receive all the papers before your surgery, it was too much I had no energy to read it all”

Pre-operative preparations

Preparations 2 weeks before surgery

Type of surgery

Time of surgery

Bring close family/friend to information meeting

Clarify when to stop anticoagulants

Fill out required forms

Patient; “I should have stopped my blood thinners 2 days before my surgery, no one asked me so I stopped them the day before because I remembered it from my last operation, but it was too late”.

Ward doctor; “When you arrive at the hospital to the information meeting it is so important that the patients bring an up to date medication list so we know what kind of medication they are using and we don’t have to wonder if they are using anticoagulants. Yes that they bring an updated list maybe this can be one of the preparations the patients need to do before their surgery”.

Inform your surgical ward

Patient forget to inform about important information

Don’t think it’s important

Other medical investigations

Cold our infections just before surgery

Patient; “If you use any form for medications or need something I believe we as patients’ needs to take some responsibility to inform before surgery. Something can happen and if you have not informed about it before your surgery it is kind of your fault”.

Nurse; “Or they actually are under investigation of other diagnoses, they have to let us know or their operation might have to be cancelled”.

Other Nurse: “or if they get sick with throat infections and can’t be operated on”.

Plan your discharge

Length of hospitalisation

Discharged before expected

Prolonged hospitalisation due to not having someone at home

Home care

Aids/bandages/medication

Planed discharge safer at home

Nurse; “the patients are very interested in the practical things before they come in, but we have to focus on the things that has to be ready before they get here and what they want after their surgery are they considering rehabilitation or do they live alone?”

Patient; “You are going to be reduced and it is wise to have someone that can look after you at home and then you have the chance to inform the nurses that you are alone and might need an extra night in the hospital”.

On admission to hospital

Need for a checklist on important info

Patients can check and request missing info

Remove rings, necklaces, piercings

When to stop eating and drinking

Pre surgery shower routines

Allergies

Updated medication list

Natural medications or nutritional supplements

Are you informed about expected pain

Patient; “It was own times on drinking clear fluids, I remember it from last time I had surgery. I was told that I could drink clear fluids until a few hours before my surgery. This time I did not receive any information so I was a bit unsure when I should stop eating and drinking”.

Ward Doctor; “We do have a journal system that is supposed to be updated with patients’ current medicines but it’s not always updated. We often use old admission notes because the patients don’t have anything with them and the referral dose not usually contain a medication list”.

Just before surgery

Are operational are marked correctly?

Avoid getting cold

Ask surgical team to use safe surgery

Patient; “The surgical team was ready and they started to look for the marked surgical site which was not there. They got a bit quiet and then they asked control questions before the operation started”.

Post-operative information

Preventions and complications

Information about complications

Often unsure at home

What is normal or not

What to do in an emergency

Special considerations

Surgeon; “It is very important that patients contact us if they experiences complications and that they adhere restrictions”.

Patient; “I thought this does not feel normal and I was walking around thinking Oh my god this is not good. I called the ward all the time because it was so swollen and warm. Oh my god this is not right but it apparently was all normal”.

Restrictions and activity

When to start exercising

Stayed in bed for weeks

Confusion about restrictions

Nurse; “Patients own efforts in relations to mobilisation and what they can do themselves to reduce hospitalisation time after their operation”.

Nurse; “At the same time it is this about training, how much can they do, because they are so scared that they will damage something or do too much. But it is important that they exercise and don’t sit down”.

Medication safety

Start new medications

Restart medications

Don’t remember information

Rushed information

Need a checklist

Ask for missing information

Medication side effects

New medication list

Surgeon; “it is very important to inform the patients. I believe it is the core reason for them taking their medicine and understanding their disease and that they contact their general practitioners”.

Patient; “I believe the most important thing the doctor did was to line up all my medications. Some of them I knew from before and some I did not know. I explained to me very clearly, what each medicine was for and how long I was going to use them. This was very useful for me especially when you take 5–6 different medicines it is easy to mix them up”.

Pain relief

Taking too little

Taking too much

Regular usage

When to stop

What to do if still in pain

Patient; “It is easy to forget when you are laying there and then suddenly you have to ouch!! You are in your own world and suddenly it is too painful and you take double the amount of pain relief you should”.

Nurse; “And it is reductions of pain relief, many patients have used large doses over longer time”.

Stomach functions

Often experiences stomach pains

Constipation

Prevention/medication

Worried something is wrong

Surgeon; “The day after it always take some time before the stomach functions work again. This is not a problem if the patients are informed about it”.

Patient; “I had problems with my stomach and I had to ask. I was informed that it was normal, I did not know that and it would have been good to know”.

Post-operative plans and follow-up

Further care

Wound care

Removal of sutures

Other treatment

Test results

Sick certificate

When can I shower; Whom to contact for questions

Nurse; “Further plan, times for things, how to treat the wound, showering, precautions and whom to contact”.

Patient; “I showered with the bandage and did not change it. I looked if there was something yellow on it because I was told to. There was some wound discharge on it the first days which made me unsure”.

Appointments

Expected time and date

Referral to other specialities

What to do if not received

Nurse; “It is not always patients feel a responsibility to enquire about missing follow-up appointments. They have to take some responsibility too”.

Patient; “kind of trust that you will get an appointment and you don’t really think about it anymore. But of course if you had a checklist or something you would go Oh I haven’t got my appointment”.