Course Description
The operating room presents an environment for many different patient safety issues to arise. It is important for nurses to understand the importance of these issues, and to take action to improve patient safety in their healthcare organization. This course will address surgical site infections, perioperative hypothermia, retained surgical items, wrong site surgery, perioperative pressure injuries, catheter-acquired urinary tract infections, central venous catheter infections, venous thromboembolism and medication errors. The goal of this course is to condense recommendations to help make it easy for you to become a patient safety champion in your OR!
Learning Objectives
Upon completion of the course, the learner will be able to:
- Define 9 key areas to improve patient safety in the OR
- Identify 2 Best Practices for each of the 9 key areas defined
- Create a plan to improve patient safety in the OR
Intended Audience
This educational activity was developed for registered nurses, clinical nurse specialists, nurse anesthetists, and nurse practitioners.
CE Information
This course is approved for 2.0 contact hours by the Florida and California State Boards of Nursing.
Course Authors
This course was created by Megan Stewart, MD and Jessica Taylor, RN and edited by Brenda Kozak, MSN, RN, CNE.
Megan received her MD Degree from the University of Kentucky College of Medicine, and trained in General Surgery in Grand Rapids, MI.
Jessica received her master’s degree in nursing and is licensed as a trauma nurse specialist.
Brenda is a certified nursed educator and has 18 years of clinical experience in nursing. She earned her Master of Science in Nursing with a focus on education.