OR Manager; Vol. 27 No. 12; December 2011 Santa dragged his lawn chair out to a sunny patch to sort through his bag of holiday gifts. With global warming, he is able to relax in shorts and a tank top instead of his traditional bulky red suit. He checked his…

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OR Manager; Vol. 27 No. 12; December 2011 Slower walking in elderly patients may signal a higher risk of postop complications and longer stays, finds a study presented at the American College of Surgeons meeting in October 2011. Surgical patients 65 and older were given a preop walking test: standing…

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OR Manager; Vol. 27 No. 12; December 2011 Take the right people and add the right software and the right processes. The result: an end-to-end surgical supply and inventory management system built on trust that yields useful data for decision making. In 2010, its first year, the team at the…

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OR Manager; Vol. 27 No. 12; December 2011 An occasional column on Joint Commission issues. The reprocessing and storage of laryngoscope blades has been a hot button for Joint Commission surveyors, and OR managers have been asking how they can comply with the expectations. In answer, the Joint Commission on…

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OR Manager; Vol. 27 No. 12; December 2011 On November 1, 2011, in posting the final 2012 outpatient payment rule, Medicare gave the ambulatory surgery center (ASC) industry a reprieve in its quality reporting deadline and an unexpected pay hike. While industry experts are pleased with what they see as…

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OR Manager; Vol. 27 No. 11; November 2011 A new high-throughput OR pod at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) in Boston is designed to expedite patient flow and make the most of the OR’s resources during regular weekday house. The 4-OR pod with 13 perianesthesia bays is part of a 28-OR…

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OR Manager; Vol. 27 No. 11; November 2011 Home washing machines may not always use hot enough water to eliminate bacteria like methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) and Acinetobacter from hospital uniforms, according to a study in the November 2011 Infection Control and Hospital Epidemiology. Researchers in the UK tested nurses’…

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OR Manager; Vol. 27 No. 11; November 2011 November 7-13, 2011, is Perioperative Nurse Week. The AORN Foundation is pleased to provide the opportunity to honor colleagues by making a donation to the Foundation in their name. An acknowledgment note will be sent to each colleague honored through a donation.…

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OR Manager; Vol. 27 No. 11; November 2011 There is no standard method for charging for OR time. In this article, 5 OR business managers describe their OR charging structures, which primarily are based on the OR minute and assign a level of service based on resource utilization. The departments…

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OR Manager; Vol. 27 No. 11; November 2011 For the first time, the Joint Commission has named the top performing hospitals on its key quality measures. On the list are 405 hospitals (about 14% of those accredited) that met 2 criteria for 2010: 95% or higher performance on a composite…

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