Reducing retained foreign objects in the operating room: a quality improvement initiative.
Keane OA, Chambers C, Brady CM, et al. Reducing retained foreign objects in the operating room: a quality improvement initiative. J Am Coll Surg. 2023;237(6):864-872. doi:10.1097/xcs.0000000000000847.
Retained foreign objects (RFO) following surgery are a never event and largely preventable. Following a decrease in days between RFO, this healthcare system implemented a quality improvement initiative across all pediatric surgical centers to reduce RFO events. Following several cycles of plan-do-study-act, days between RFO events increased from 29 to 451 days and that number of days was sustained at one year.