TO DYE FOR Multiskilled technician Amy Harrison (red), anesthesiologist Steven Lechiara, MD (black), surgeon Robert Nowinski, DO (navy blue), Jaime Stewart, RN (light blue), and sales rep Michael Rodriguez (gray) show off their colors.

Shades of Difference
A Colorful Way to Help Patients ID Providers

We use a palette of different colors to help our patients keep track of who's who. One of the concerns we heard from patients and their families was that they didn't always know whom they were talking to at our facility — was it a nurse, a therapist, a physician? They weren't sure. Yes, everyone wore badges, but sometimes patients couldn't see the badges, or the badges were flipped over.

That gave us an idea. To make identification easier, we started using color-coded scrubs for all members of our team — surgeons, anesthesia providers, vendors and all the other disciplines within the hospital.

It helps in several ways. We educate patients before they come in, and again in pre-op, so they always know whom they're talking to. For example, in pre-op, the nurse will tell the patient, "An anesthesiologist will be stopping by to speak to you, and he'll have a black uniform on." Later, if there's any question, the nurse can ask, "Did someone in black come and talk to you?"

It helps with vendors, too. Since the scrubs we have them wear are gray, instead of the traditional green, we can know for sure whether they've changed into sterile scrubs since they arrived. Color-coding has even helped us identify each other. Ours is a relatively new facility, so we have a lot of staff members who'd never worked together before.

Diane Doucette, RN, MBA
Mount Carmel New Albany Surgical Hospital
New Albany, Ohio
[email protected]