Recently National Time Out Day was practiced in hospitals and ambulatory surgery centers around the country. Taking a “time out” to confirm correct patient, correct procedure, correct surgical site and other important information before every operative and other invasive procedure is a requirement of the Joint Commission Universal Protocol. Despite the requirement, 40-60 wrong-site surgeries likely occur in the U.S. each week.
Time Out Day was created by the Association of perioperative Registered Nurses in 2004 as a way to raise awareness about the importance of requiring the entire surgical team to pause before all invasive procedures to communicate as a group and confirm key information about the patient and procedure to help prevent errors from occurring.
Wrong patient, wrong site, wrong procedures are sentinel events – described by The Joint Commission as “an unexpected occurrence involving death or serious physical or psychological injury, or the risk thereof.” To perioperative nurses, they are tragedies.