Decreasing intraoperative delays with meaningful use of the surgical safety checklist.

Background: Purposeful completion (fidelity) more than simple adherence to items in the surgical safety checklist may improve operating room efficiency and patient safety. The purpose of this study was to evaluate intraoperative delays and correlate them with adherence and fidelity to the preincision surgical safety checklist.

Methods: Trained observers evaluated surgical safety checklist compliance during 3 observation periods from 2014-2016.

Debriefing: the forgotten phase of the surgical safety checklist.

Background: The debriefing phase of the surgical safety checklist (SSC) provides the operative team an opportunity to share pertinent intraoperative information and communicate postoperative plans. Prior quality improvement initiatives at our institution focused on the preincision phase of the SSC; however, the debriefing phase has not been evaluated. We aimed to assess adherence to the debrief checklist at our institution and identify areas for improvement.