Postoperative handover: problems, pitfalls, and prevention of error.

Kamal Nagpal; Sonal Arora; May Abboudi; Amit Vats; Helen W. Wong; Chhavi Manchanda; Charles A. Vincent; Krishna Moorthy

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Postoperative handover: problems, pitfalls, and prevention of error.

June 16, 2010

Nagpal K, Arora S, Abboudi M, et al. Ann Surg. 2010;252(1):171-6.

View more articles from the same authors.

This qualitative study interviewed 18 providers and found that postoperative handovers are informal, unstructured, and fraught with inconsistent and incomplete information transfer. These data were used to develop and validate a formal handover protocol. Prior studies have used insights from Formula One auto racing to inform improvement strategies for postoperative handoffs, and the World Health Organization's Surgical Safety Checklist explicitly emphasizes structured handoffs at the time of patient transfer from the operating room to the postoperative area.

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Discontinuities, Gaps, and Hand-Off Problems

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