RECENT FEATURE ARTICLES

Kate Woodhead RGN DMS provides an insight into the second National Safety Standards for Invasive Procedures, aimed at improving patient safety. She welcomes the new standards and hopes that theatre teams will fully engage with them.

Wassenburg has pioneered in the field of endoscope decontamination, with the aim of improving patient safety. However, the company’s vision goes beyond just ensuring a clean scope – with the company’s CEOs setting out a commitment to sustainable and ethical values.

Professor Melvin Lobo, director of the internationally renowned Barts Blood Pressure Clinic, saw one major positive outcome of the pandemic – people becoming more engaged in their own health, with proactive, self-directed blood pressure (BP) monitoring. He explains why this approach can vastly improve the understanding of patterns in hypertensive patients and, in turn, lead to better patient outcomes.

Harald Huber discusses the importance of working with clinicians on product development to maximise infection prevention in endoscopy.

To cope with the challenges of the future, it is critical to optimise diagnostic services and enable faster and earlier testing. Tracey Sainsbury discusses the key challenges and opportunities ahead

Dr. Steve Fox argues that the healthcare sector must consider how insourced staff can be used appropriately to embed long-term resilience in the NHS workforce.

Burnout, mental health struggles and a lack of work-life balance have been given as the main reasons for staff leaving the NHS. Sophie Evans, a former critical care nurse and now a clinical consultant for health communications specialist Ascom, discusses why it has never been more important for the NHS to bring back the joy to nursing, and how technology can play a major role.

Not all instruments can be guaranteed clean, especially those with narrow lumens. Jon Blastland argues that single-use alternatives could help reduce the risk of surgical site infection.

Transrectal (TRUS) biopsies can yield inaccuracies in identifying potential cancer cells, while the nature of the procedure brings an increased likelihood of infection. Efforts are underway to phase out the procedure and Trusts are moving to alternative approaches. Over the past two years, the South-West of England has widely adopted the PrecisionPoint Transperineal Access

Roberta Charlett examines the case for switching to reusable surgical textiles and the steps that will be required to successfully implement this.

Nigel Roberts, head theatre practitioner, at Birmingham Women’s and Children’s NHS Hospital Trust, provides an insight into a Delphi Study (round one), which has sought to understand current practice around the use of the WHO Surgical Safety Checklist and some of the challenges around implementation.

Sustainability, training, automation, and patient safety were among the hot topics discussed at the Institute of Decontamination Sciences (IDSc) annual conference. Top experts gave their views on the challenges ahead and key areas that must be addressed to ensure safe, efficient and sustainable sterile services.

Kate Woodhead RGN DMS considers the extreme pressures being faced by the NHS and what needs to be done to address the ‘gridlock’ currently being experienced across the system.

Simple, and relatively inexpensive, steps to implement care bundles can have a dramatic impact on rates of surgical site infection. The Burden of Infection Symposium provided an insight into the latest evidence and guidance around best practice, as well as offering expert advice on ‘overcoming the challenges of change’. Louise Frampton reports.

As ultrasound becomes ubiquitous, smart technologies are playing a vital role in diagnostic speed and accuracy. Medical device manufacturer, Mindray, is pioneering smart tools for ultrasound applications to enhance accuracy and speed of examinations and boost clinical confidence and decision-making.

Pre-eclampsia is one of the most common causes of maternal morbidity and mortality. However, the methods used to initially determine the presence of the disease have not changed in decades and rely on simple non-specific parameters. These markers are poor at predicting risk, and cases of pre-eclampsia often progress rapidly and unpredictably, warns Dawn Hannah.

Carole Hallam argues that the use of air decontamination systems to improve indoor air quality should be considered as part of Trusts’ infection prevention and control strategies. She warns that hand hygiene and surface cleaning are not enough.

With Integrated Care Boards (ICB) having moved onto statutory footing, it is time to use digital connectivity to join up services – starting with emergency care, argues Mike Farrar, former chief executive of the NHS Confederation and North-West England Strategic Health Authorities.

Chris Gale, head of education for Avensys Training, is from a military education background and believes that human factors science, which has been adopted by the military aviation sector, could have an important contribution in helping to prevent errors in decontamination facilities and biomedical engineering. He calls for increased investment in staff education – to empower staff to understand why we do things, to improve patient safety, and ensure staff feel valued.

Nigel Roberts examines the evidence around the incidence of surgical fires, as well as current guidance to prevent associated harm. He considers whether surgical fires should be classed as a ‘Never Event’ and whether mitigating steps should be incorporated into the WHO surgical safety checklist