Objective
To evaluate the efficacy of a surgical safety checklist (SSC) in reducing perioperative and postoperative complications.
Study design
Before‐and‐after intervention study.
Animals
Client‐owned dogs (n = 633) and cats (n = 44).
Methods
Consecutive surgeries were enrolled in the study. The “before” phase consisted of 267 surgeries performed without an SSC (SSC−) followed by 75 SSC− surgeries in which a trained observer was in the operating room to detect possible complications. An SSC was then implemented in the operating rooms during 1 week. The “after” phase consisted of 58 surgeries in which a safety checklist (SSC+) and an observer were used and 277 SSC+ surgeries without an observer. Complications were prospectively recorded when witnessed by the observer, and all other perioperative complications were retrospectively recorded from veterinary records and client telephone communication.
Results
There were more perioperative and postoperative complications when surgeries were performed without an SSC (140/342 [40.9%; 95% CI, 35.7%‐46.4%]) than there were when surgeries were performed with an SSC (98/335 [29.3%; 95% CI, 24.4%‐34.4%]; P = .002). Surgical checklist use, presence of an observer, American Society of Anesthesiologists score, and anesthesia time were all independently associated with the odds of complications.
Conclusion
Implementation of an SSC in an academic teaching hospital decreased the odds of perioperative and postoperative surgical complications.
Clinical significance
This study supports the use of an SSC to prevent surgical complications in veterinary teaching hospitals.
The AmpFISTR SEfiler kit co-amplifies 11 short tandem repeat loci including SE33 in a single multiplex. After establishing the optimum in primer titration studies, the primer concentrations of all loci in the multiplex were chosen such that the heterozygote peak height ratios of each of the loci were balanced. The combined primer set was then tested to determine the robustness of the multiplex under various conditions. Different MgCl(2) concentrations were evaluated to establish the optimum concentration for the multiplex. The amplification of the various loci in the multiplex was tested at several annealing temperatures (55-63 degrees C). Additionally, DNA from primates, non-primates and microorganisms were amplified to investigate the specificity of the kit. The stability of the AmpFISTR SEfiler kit was determined by addition of hematin, to simulate inhibition, and the use of degraded DNA. Population studies revealed a probability of identity of 6.47x10(-15) for African Americans and 7.46x10(-14) for US Caucasians. To assess the ability of the multiplex to analyze forensic samples, testing on blood, oral swabs and mixtures was performed. Based on the various studies, it was determined that the AmpFISTR SEfiler PCR amplification kit can be used to successfully analyze a variety of forensic, databasing and paternity samples.
A portable label-free multimodal nonlinear optical imaging platform has been developed and demonstrated for intraoperative imaging of needle biopsies in canine cancer surgeries, with investigations on the integrity of freshly excised biopsies over time.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.