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• Human Factors in Health Care Tool Kit

The AORN Foundation has championed the application of Crew Resource Management (CRM) training in health care settings. Through a generous grant from Kimberly-Clark Health Care, the AORN Foundation rolled out a pilot Human Factors in Health Care Demonstration Project at five diverse surgical and procedural facilities around the country to measure the impact of a structured human factors team training program in perioperative settings.

Safer Healthcare, an organization that implements high reliability programming and training programs for high risk organizations, including clinical units, air ambulance operations, and health care systems, worked in tandem with the AORN Foundation in implementing this project and creating the content for this tool kit.

The evidence-based items in this tool kit are made available to AORN members to help with the development and implementation of a human factors program in the perioperative environment. The documents and tools presented on this site are meant to serve as a resource to help program managers with the research, planning, design, and execution of a team-training program.

Download the tool kit and awareness posters now.

Overview
Human factors skills are crucial to health care teams in safety-critical environments. When health care teams work well together, threats and errors can be recognized, prioritized, and managed before an adverse outcome becomes a reality. In spite of increased automation and the use of technology, individual error remains inevitable due to human limitations constrained by normal everyday stressors such as fatigue and multitasking. The operational world will always be imperfect. Proactively initiating human factors skill development is the essential foundation to making the clinical workplace safer for staff and patients.

Understanding the relationship between humans, their tools, and the environment in which they work is the focus of human factors training. Human factors medical team training using CRM methodology is a practical and repeatable system for enhancing patient safety and improving teamwork and communication skills among operating room (OR) staff. This team-based approach of hands-on, classroom-based training is effective in improving and demonstrating increased levels of patient safety awareness, team behaviors, and the cultural climate of perioperative patient safety.

Contact Hour Information
AORN Members may earn contact hours by completing the Human Factors in Health Care Tool Kit Independent Study. Simply download the tool kit, follow the directions, and complete the learner evaluation and answer sheet. Members may earn 1.0 free contact hours through December 31, 2010.

Accreditation Statement
AORN is accredited as a provider of continuing nursing education by the American Nurses Credentialing Center's Commission on Accreditation.

AORN is a provider approved by the California Board of Registered Nursing, Provider Number CEP 13019. Check with your state board of nursing for acceptability of education content for re-licensure.

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NOTICE
No responsibility is assumed by AORN, Inc. for any injury and/or damage to persons or property as a matter of products liability, negligence or otherwise, or from any use or operation of any standards, recommended practices, methods, products, instructions, or ideas contained in the material herein. Because of rapid advances in the health care sciences in particular, independent verification of diagnoses, medication dosages, and individualized care and treatment should be made. The material contained herein is not intended to be a substitute for the exercise of professional medical or nursing judgment The content in this publication is provided on an as is basis.

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