Peri-Operative Nursing: Roles, Safety Issues, and Legal Aspects

Running head: CLINICAL INTRIGATION 0
Legal Aspects of Health Care Management
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PERI-OPERATIVE NURSING 1
Module 1
Peri-operative nursing involves pre-operative, intra-operative and post-operative
procedures. It includes the period right before surgery, during and after surgery. This paper aims
to analyze the roles of peri operative nurses, the safety issues that may arise and the legal aspect
involved to guarantee patient safety and well-being.
Peri- operative nurses are to ensure proper patient care by implementing nursing care for
patients before, during and after surgery (Bingham, Walsh & Ford, 2018). Their roles include;
assessing physical, psychological and social states of patients, ensuring the maintenance of a
clean and sterile surgical environment, educating the patient before and after the operation,
checking on the emotional and physical state of the patient during the peri-operative period,
upholding consistent patient care throughout the operative procedure ( Laopoulou et al., 2018).
Safety issues are bound to arise in any operation procedure therefore nurses need to be
extremely vigilant to minimize and completely eliminate occurrence of any risk likely to cause
patient’s deteriorating condition. The most common issues that are bound to arise include;
operating on the wrong patient for a given procedure, operating on the wrong organ of the body,
patient undergoing a different operation procedure from the one initially intended, mistakenly
leaving foreign objects in patient’s body and complications during and after surgery (Almquist,
2013)
These common mistakes can be avoided if each of the given health practitioners is careful
in their designated tasks. Peri-operative nurses, with the major role in the operative procedure,
need to be the most active in ensuring high quality medical care is upheld. Being responsible for
education of patients on the operating procedures, they need to be a source of emotional support
to the patients by ensuring they are well versed with the procedure they are to undergo and are

PERI-OPERATIVE NURSING 2
aware of any possible complications. Moreover, they need to ensure that the patient has
consented to the procedure while reporting any general concerns that the patient may have to the
designated doctor without delay.
Safety measures that should be implemented by nurses to minimize and eliminate
surgical safety issues are as follows ( Dewes, 2018);
Identity of the patient should be verified before anesthesia is induced to prevent operation on the
wrong patient.
Ensure surgical site and the surgical procedure to be performed match the consent form provided
for the named patient.
Identify any known allergies before inducing anesthesia and ensure the patient is well positioned
Ensure that the anesthesia provider has shared any possible risks that the drug may pose and
possible safety measures recommended.
Ensure every member of the surgical team is well prepared for the surgery before incision.
A consent form has to be signed by a patient before any operating procedure is carried
out. Legally, the consent form should only be signed after the health practitioner has explained
the procedure to the patient and has elaborated all possible options other than surgery. The health
practitioner should also enumerate all the risks that come with the procedure to enable the patient
make an informed decision. This is referred to as informed consent.
Immediately the patient signs the form and agrees to the procedure, the surgical team is
bound by the terms of the contract thus expected to maintain a high degree of professionalism
during the peri-operative period. Their sole duty is to ensure holistic well-being of the patient
whose life depends on their expertise ( Fisher, 2013). Any breach of the terms of the contract