Rural hospitals in the US have been facing a prolonged, multifaceted crisis. The literature presents several reasons for why healthcare facilities in rural areas struggle, including shrinking budgets, rising chronic illness and public health issues like addiction and obesity, poor telehealth and broadband access, aging populations, deteriorating mental health, and…

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Gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopy is one of the most common procedures in the US. Performed more than 17.1 million times per year in inpatient and outpatient hospital settings as well as ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs), GI procedures account for 68% of all endoscopies, according to a May 2022 article in Digestive…

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When it comes to the adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) in medicine, radiology is leading the charge. As of May 13, 2024, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had approved nearly 900 AI- and machine learning (ML)-enabled devices, and the vast majority of them are in radiology. One example…

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Complex problems do not always require complex solutions. Consider the surgical safety checklist. In 2020, more than a decade after the World Health Organization (WHO) started advocating that every hospital use the checklist, research from PSNET found that more than 90% of ORs in countries with a high human development…

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Reforming instrument reprocessing practices does not always end with the main sterile processing department (SPD). Holding clinics to the same standard adds to the challenge, whether they are associated with hospitals or operate independently. Nonetheless, standardization is just as essential to maintaining efficiency and quality standards. Whether a clinic is…

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For me, the answer is easy. For 25 years I have consistently said, “I’ve never nursed an OR a day in my life; it’s always been the patients.” As perioperative nurses, what we do is about more than where we work. Why is it that 25 years after the Association…

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More than 4 years after personal protective equipment production and inventories crashed amid the global COVID-19 pandemic, the “new normal” in healthcare supply chains seems to be “uncertainty.” Although hospital margins are improving and patient volumes are trending upward, “stress fractures continue to remain in place,” says Michael Schiller, CMRP,…

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Inspecting surgical devices is a time-consuming process. However, diligently checking every instrument prior to sterilization is essential to ensuring safe, proper functioning. As the last people to see devices before they are used for patient care, sterile processing technicians must be thorough. Exterior surfaces should be inspected for flaws such…

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