The Importance of Preoperative Briefing on Surgical Patient Outcomes

Abstract

The operating room is a high-risk setting where adverse events are more likely to occur. Providing quality surgical care requires not only technical expertise but also essential non-technical skills, such as strong teamwork and clear communication among healthcare professionals. On the other hand, patients and their families have a justified expectation that healthcare providers will prioritize safety within medical settings. Despite its importance, patient safety did not receive adequate focus until recently. In a study by Vacheron et al. of 219 claims analyzed, the most affected specialties were orthopaedics (34%), neurosurgery (14%), and dentistry (14%), with 69% of incidents occurring in public healthcare facilities. These errors were largely due to the wrong organ (44%), wrong side (39%), wrong patient (13%), and wrong procedure (4%) (14). Hempel et al. also reported that current estimates for wrong-site surgery and retained surgical items are 1 event per 100,000 and 1 event per 10,000 procedures, respectively, but the precision is uncertain, while root-cause analyses suggest the need for improved communication (7). Technical and medical problems are not the main contributing factors to adverse events; rather, problems in communication or insufficient teamwork are leading to errors in healthcare. Other industries, such as aviation, have long acknowledged the role of human factors in errors and proactively work to identify and mitigate these risks. In the airline industry, studies connecting strong team dynamics with flight safety prompted specialized teamwork training, which has since been linked to enhanced safety outcomes. High-risk healthcare settings, such as labour and delivery, critical care, and especially surgery, share many of the core aspects seen in aviation, where individuals collaborate in a high-tech and high-risk work environment (8).