10 Ways to Apply the Guidelines in Your Daily Life

The evidence-based recommendations in each of AORN’s 33 guidelines provide best practices for safety and reducing risk in the perioperative setting.

But how can the guidelines translate to safe and efficient actions beyond the perioperative setting?

AORN Perioperative Specialist Julie Cahn, DNP, RN, CNOR, RN-BC, ACNS-BC, CNS-CP, took on the challenge of considering how the guidelines translate in everyday life and she found a solid list of examples, ranging from safe patient handling for preventing back injuries at home to hand hygiene in protecting your family from infections.

“We rely on evidence-based guidelines for practice in the OR but many of the same principles can be applied to daily life,” Cahn says.

Here are 10 ways to apply the guidelines beyond the workplace:

1. Use the right tools to get the job done—When cleaning your water bottles at the kitchen sink, use the correctly-sized brush that touches all interior surfaces. As we know from the Guideline for Processing Flexible Endoscopes, the diameter of the brush must match the diameter lumen it is used in. Not only does using the correct-sized brush complete the task sooner but it is more effective at cleaning and reduces the risk of bioburden build-up.


2. Consider automated cleaning and decontamination when possible—Depending on your dishwasher, it could be more effective at cleaning than hand washing your dishes and it could use less resources, such as water, electricity and time. According to the Guideline for Cleaning and Care of Surgical Instruments, “automated cleaning and decontamination provides an effective level of cleaning that is difficult to replicate consistently using manual methods.”


3. Hand hygiene and Infection prevention is everything— Your hands and environment should be clean. The Guideline for Hand Hygiene discusses some important tips for the health of the skin on your hands. For example, removing your watch and jewelry prior to washing your hands makes handwashing more effective. If your family is experiencing cold or flu symptoms, consider what extra cleaning measures could be taken.


4. Your surroundings matter—How you set up your environment has an impact on your health, wellbeing, and efficiency. The updated Guideline for Design and Maintenance of the Surgical Suite outlines principles of planning and design concepts for the OR. In your home environment, thinking about planning and design concepts can support your life goals and may help you check them off your list sooner. For instance, a well-organized desk will help you get things done, and storing items where they are used will save time.


5. Have a safety plan—The Guideline for a Safe Environment of Care outlines hazards that can be found in the OR environment and ways to protect yourself and your patients. AORN has a newly updated tool kit for Emergency Preparedness and one of the steps is to ensure that personnel have an emergency preparedness plan for their family. In your home, it is important to be prepared for the disasters that are most likely to affect your area.


6. Practice self-care—The Guideline for Complementary Care Interventions suggests the use of music, massage therapy, acupuncture and acupressure, aromatherapy, hypnosis, and Reiki for patients. These self-care strategies may work for you, too.


7. Take care of unused or expired medications—Reviewing your medications on a routine basis can help you eliminate potentially ineffective medications that are expired and help you identify what you have and what you may need. According to the Guideline for Medication Safety, some medications may be classified as controlled substances or medical hazardous waste. There may be specific federal, state, or local requirements for disposal of these medications. If you are uncertain, ask your pharmacist prior to disposing of unused or expired medications.


8. Get good sleep—The Guideline for Positioning the Patient has recommendations to maintain physiologic body alignment to reduce the potential for injury during long periods of inactivity. Think about your body alignment when you sleep. Does your position, pillow, and mattress allow you to align your body in a way that is reducing your potential for injury?


9. Protect yourself and your family from identify theft—The Guideline for Patient Information Management has interventions to keep patient health information protected. Have you thought about the safety of your personal information lately? Identity theft is serious and taking steps to reduce your risk is important.


10. Reduce your risk for a back injury—New in the 2019, the Guideline for Safe Patient Handling and Movement introduced interventions that reduce your risk of musculoskeletal disorders. Using the interventions for how you push, pull, lift, carry, and store things at home is important. Think about reorganizing where items are stored, how you have things stored, and the weight of the item.

Here are a few more OR strategies that can work at home, too:

• Try new things—Just like attending a nursing conference gives us new ideas and practice perspectives, trying new things or studying concepts from other disciplines such as the social sciences or different cultures can help you gain new perspectives in life.
• Be biased toward action—This will help you get things done and clear off your to-do list.
• Be as efficient as possible—Surgeons use two hands to be efficient. We should find ways to duplicate this.
• Move it once and be done with it—Think about how you set up your sterile field. You try to move things just once and put it in a specific place that is most effective for when you need to use it. This concept can be applied to many things, such as putting things away in a timely manner, and storing items in the area where they are typically used.
• Monitor your outcomes and do continuous performance improvement—Use your smartphone and apps to track things you want to improve. Social scientists have long recognized the power of improvement through tracking.

Additional Resources

Access the Facility Reference Center to find AORN Guidelines, and other practice resources.

Visit the Federal Emergency management Agency (FEMA) website for resources on how to best prepare yourself or your family for a disaster.

Free Resources for Members

Guideline Essentials: Easily and quickly apply EBPs for 27 guidelines with ready-to-use and customizable templates & tools:

• Policy & Procedure Templates: Develop your facility’s policies and procedures.
• Gap Analysis Tools: Assess areas in which your facility may not be compliant with the guidelines.
• Competency Verification Tools: Verify competency to meet facility requirements.
• Quick Views: Photos, illustrations, videos, and overviews of the guideline.
• And more