We use the papers to frame our discussion: A Systematic Review of the Effectiveness, Compliance, and Critical Factors for Implementation of Safety Checklists in Surgery; Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of the Effect of the World Health Organization Surgical Safety Checklist on Post-Operative Complications; and The Effects of Safety Checklists in Medicine.

Tune in to hear our thoughts on this potentially life or death issue.

Topics:

• The good reputation of checklists.
• Equipment Failure.
• The decrease of information loss.
• Do checklists slow things down?
• How closely checklists are followed.
• The rhyme of reason for checklists.

Quotes:

“Checklists are one of those things that have been associated with safety for a long time and associated in a way that gives them quite a good name.”

“Lots of stuff being recorded as positively improving with the introduction of a checklist.”

“If you can’t convince a multidisciplinary team that this belongs on the checklist, because they all agree there is a clear link between this item and a particular accident that they all know about, then you don’t get to put it on the checklist.”

Resources:

Borchard, A., Schwappach, D.L., Barbir, A., & Bezzola, P. (2012).A Systematic Review of the Effectiveness, Compliance, and Critical Factors for Implementation of Safety Checklists in Surgery Annals of Surgery, 256, 925–933. 

Bergs, J., Hellings, J., Cleemput, I., Zurel, Ö., De Troyer, V., Van Hiel, M., ... & Vandijck, D. (2014). Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of the Effect of the World Health Organization Surgical Safety Checklist on Post-Operative Complications. British Journal of Surgery, 101(3), 150-158.

Thomassen, Ø., Storesund, A., Søfteland, E., & Brattebø, G. (2014). The Effects of Safety Checklists in Medicine: a systematic review. Acta Anaesthesiologica Scandinavica, 58(1), 5-18.

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