Vocational School of Justice
THE POWER OF COMMUNICATION IN THE OR SAVES LIVES
The nurses say, ‘We are a part of the team’ in the operating rooms which is considered a crossroad for patients. The nurses, who are celebrating the European Perioperative Nurses Day on February 15th, point out the importance of power of communication between surgical team consisted of surgeons, assistant surgeons, and anesthetists in order not to hinder health services.
Prof. Dr. Filiz Öğçe, IUE Faculty of Health Sciences, Head of Department of Nursing, and President of Turkish Perioperative Nurses Association, stated that this year’s theme was “United: Perioperative Team and Patient Safety”, and she said, “Teamwork is an important element of quality of patient safety and patient care. Therefore, we want to emphasize the importance of communication between teams. Patient care in the operating room requires teamwork. It requires both technical and non-technical skills as communication, decision making, and sharing of situational awareness.”
‘Lack of Communication Harms Patients’
Prof. Dr. Öğçe said that the Ministry of Health offered Perioperative Nursing certificate programs since 2014, high school graduates became certified nursing assistants, and university education became very crucial. “Nurses have the major workload among the surgical teams. Therefore, effective communication needs to be established. Miscommunication or lack of communication may lead to incorrect operations, mistreatments, errors in organ transplantations, transfusions with wrong type of blood, and medication errors, etc., said Prof. Dr. Öğçe.