key: cord-0772709-f55b1prr
authors: Armstrong, B A; Gordon, L; Grantcharov, T P; Palter, V N
title: The importance of feedback for surgical teams during the COVID-19 pandemic
date: 2020-07-29
journal: Br J Surg
DOI: 10.1002/bjs.11853
sha: 1b4767689659bdffb9f8a1d9fcc47bef90bc65a9
doc_id: 772709
cord_uid: f55b1prr

nan

Under the best of circumstances, it can be challenging to provide the feedback necessary to maintain and improve individual and team performance. Our team developed the operating room (OR) Black Box ® (Surgical Safety Technologies, Inc) -a technology that continuously captures and synchronizes multiple sources of intraoperative video and audio data. Postoperatively, analysts identify safety threats and resilience supports that may respectively contribute to, or help to avoid adverse events, so targeted interventions can be implemented to promote patient safety. Over the last ten years, our group has researched effective ways to reduce surgical error and optimize surgical safety using feedback 3-5 .

To address the need for feedback during the COVID pandemic at our institution, we developed the COVID Black Box. Data from simulation scenarios on COVID-positive patients recorded via the COVID Black Box is assessed to detect breaches in infection control practices, and identify suboptimal performance for improvement. Specific and timely feedback is provided to equip OR personnel on how to correct misinformation, improve responses, and facilitate behavioural change on an operative team-level. Although formal analysis has yet to be conducted, qualitative downstream effects of feedback observed include an increased sense of control, reduced stress, improved team communication, feelings of managerial support, and more positive attitudes indicative of the organizational safety culture.

During this global pandemic, hospitals and surgical departments should not underestimate the importance of providing their teams with feedback. Hospitals without comprehensive recording capabilities should establish systematic methods of providing feedback to OR teams such as video recording operations or assigning dedicated observers to record breaches in safety practices. This feedback should be presented to surgical teams immediately and continuously, and collated for the larger institution on a regular basis to transparently communicate lessons learned from previous surgical cases. Specific and timely feedback may reduce preventable errors in surgery during the pressures of the pandemic. With ongoing effort to support our surgical teams and better performance, we can help our frontline OR staff and patients during both the first, and subsequent waves of this pandemic. B. A. Armstrong 1,* , L. Gordon 1,2,* , T. P. Grantcharov 1 and V. N. Palter 1

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