I bet you’ve seen the new Snickers commercial, the one where the doctor leans over the patient and talks into his cell phone which he has LEFT inside the patient’s abdomen after a surgery. The commercial ends with a tagline, “You’re Careless When You’re Hungry.”
Well for about a dozen Americans a day, that commercial is no laughing matter. Retained surgical items are foreign objects that are left inside the body cavity after surgery by a surgeon and his or her team of nurses. Items left behind are drill bit fragments, screws, needles and most often surgical sponges.
Surgical sponges are small 2 x 2 inch or larger squares of gauze used to soak up blood during surgery. Doctors and or nurses are required to count the number of sponges used during surgery and then count the number of sponges removed from the body before the incision is closed. Often, the numbers don’t match and recounts are done.
In 2003, retained surgical sponges and instruments ranked as the most serious category for medical errors. In 2018, it still ranks as the most common surgical error.
And it is a deadly one.
A retained surgical sponge, for example, does not just stay where it was left. It swells and becomes infected and that infection spreads throughout the body. Sponges themselves often migrate and damage vulnerable tissue and vital organs.
