Perioperative Quality Newsletter

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Welcome to the 18th newsletter from the orthopedics quality team! We are excited to share that on April 26th, New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center hosted the fourth annual Spine Safety Summit, highlighting safety and quality advances with a focus on optimizing outcomes and transforming patient care. We had an incredible keynote speech by Dr. Steven Ondra, on "Safety at the Macroeconomic Level" and we’re excited to include some thoughts on the event.

Danielle Wiggins, Quality and Performance Improvement Fellow
Dr. Michael Vitale, Vice-Chair, Strategy & Quality
Dr. William Levine, Chairman

This year's Spine Safety Summit was another great success focusing on three key themes of reducing variability, optimizing the power of the group, and thinking creatively.

"Once again, NYP hosted another sold out Spine Safety Summit where leaders in the field converged to discuss best practices in spine surgery safety. One of the highlights of the meeting revolved around Dedicated Spine Teams, as paper after paper have now documented improvements in safety, throughput, communication and culture when Dedicated Spine Teams were employed. Key aspects of the Dedicated Spine Team related to these gains include >70% of work effort devoted to spine, some protected cognitive time for the senior nurse on the team to plan and organize, and communication outside of the OR regarding upcoming cases but also obstacles to excellence. Dedicated Spine Teams make care better."

-- Michael G. Vitale, MD, MPH, Spine Safety Summit Chair

We'd like to send well wishes to our past Director of Quality and Patient Value, Kevin Wang, MHA, on his new Senior Director position at Hospital for Special Surgery. Thank you for all of your hard work over the years and best of luck on your future endeavors!

Check out the following reading list on improving safety and quality of care!

Safety of Overlapping Inpatient Orthopaedic Surgery
Overlapping surgery is often used to maximize efficiency, but is it safe? The Washington School of Medicine conducted a multicenter study to provide insight into the safety of this practice. judging by the occurrence of perioperative risks and complications.

The Effect of Time During the Academic Year or Resident Training Level on Complication Rates After Lower-Extremity Orthopaedic Trauma Procedures
Casp, et al., seek to evaluate if there is a correlation between complications after orthopedic trauma surgery and the level of training of the resident involved or the timing of the academic year.

Predictors of Chronic Prescription Opioid Use After Orthopedic Surgery: Derivation of a Clinical Prediction Rule
Majority of research has been focused on opioid abuse as opposed to chronic use, which is also associated with numerous adverse effects that develop over time. This study provides insight into identifying patient variables that can predict chronic opioid use following orthopedic surgery.

Operating Room Efficiency
Optimizing efficiency and productivity in the operating room can have many benefits from improving cost savings to improving quality and safety of patient care. Rothstein and Raval provide insight into how manufacturing principles and processes such as Lean and Six Sigma can be applied to the operating room to improve efficiency in many areas.