Coffee in the OR

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sevoflurane

sevoflurane

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20+ Year Member
Is it really that big of a deal? 😕

I don't think so. Keep a lid on it, and sip away near the back of the room.

I'm sure it's infectious risk is zero, or less🙂)).
 
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It was common place in the ORs in Ireland when I was there. 👍
 
I've seen soft drinks and coffee in the ASC, but never in the main ORs when I rotated. I'd agree though that I don't think it should be a big deal unless there's a risk of it spilling and burning someone.

It probably also depends on how jealous the surgeons might get 😛
 
sevoflurane said:
Is it really that big of a deal? 😕

I don't think so. Keep a lid on it, and sip away near the back of the room.

I'm sure it's infectious risk is zero, or less🙂)).
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Since when did rules have anything to do with reality?
You're not a doctor anymore, you are a healthcare professional. Stop thinking like a doctor.

I'll drink coffee in the O R if I'm close with all the nurses in the room. Others would get off on making a big deal out of nothing.
 
Our AA students rotating through a couple hospitals in the UK tell us that drinking coffee, etc in the OR is common with their anaesthetists - and no masks either.
 
Drinks and small snacks are perfectly acceptable as long as there are no clipboards nearby. And don't show the surgeons, they get jealous.
 
Our OR just banned wood fiberboard clip boards.....they must be nonporous plastic or metal. The irony....the clipboarders are telling us we are using the wrong kind of clipboard! And we must now sterilize laryngoscope handles between each use. Anybody else doing this? And yes to discrete snacks and coffee.
 
I've seen a neurosurgeon doing a clipping have the circulating nurse feed him M & Ms and then sip diet coke through a straw under his mask away from the patient without breaking scrub.


It's no big deal.


That said we live in a crazy JCAHO infested world and you will get dinged if caught.
 
nimbus said:
And we must now sterilize laryngoscope handles between each use. Anybody else doing this?
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They started doing this back at my residency program about when I was about 1/2 way through. Get ready for a lot of dim/non-functional laryngoscope handles.
 
Mman said:
I've seen a neurosurgeon doing a clipping have the circulating nurse feed him M & Ms and then sip diet coke through a straw under his mask away from the patient without breaking scrub.


It's no big deal.


That said we live in a crazy JCAHO infested world and you will get dinged if caught.
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I do it and sometimes eat if surgeon slow I eat lunch too
 
Speaking of crazy clipboard people, do you guys have to lock away ALL your drugs between cases? I'm talking everything from narcs to neosporin.
JCAHo just came through and now, we don't even have drape clips anymore, bc they must be sterile...we're using tape :O now all our IV poles are sticky!
 
somedumbDO said:
I do it and sometimes eat if surgeon slow I eat lunch too
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Same here. During residency, kind circulating nurses would sneak hard candy and chocolate to me out of surgeon's eyesight.

I would totally bring coffee to the OR if I could. Maybe I'll start with performance gels for sustenance in long cases.

I miss having mandated breaks. Can't complain about the money I now make as a big time attending, though!

You'll have problems whether you are rich or poor, and I say it's better to have problems and money than without money.
 
No food or drink in our OR's
We went to disposable laryngoscope blades - hate them
All drugs are locked in the cart between cases - techs will throw them away if not
All drugs must be labeled with drug name, concentration, initials, date and time expired
No outside scrubs
No t shirts exposed
Handwashing is monitored/reported by nurses when entering and leaving a patient room
Safe surgery checklist performed on every patient

You get used to it.
 
Coffee is frowned upon in our OR's as well. I started running a couple lengths of K50 tubing from the travel mug in my bag up to an easily accessible location. Now I can sip away and no one's the wiser.

Coffee? What Coffee?? :ninja:😉

On a completely unrelated side note, what is it with nurses? Today I drop off a pt in the ICU and it's full of 23yo thin, blonde, attractive nurses. Got me thinking, you never see thin attractive middle aged nurses. At what point in their career do they automatically go from young and hot to old, overweight, and surly? I swear they're like asian women. They look like they're 20 till they're 50, then they look like they're 90.
 
In our ORs we aren't allowed to have any food or drink period. The way our ORs are set up though, there's always access to a place where you can stash your coffee near your room.

My attendings/residents will send me to get coffee and then I go back into the room and they take turns stepping out of the room.

To be fair, I don't think a little coffee in the OR would be bad. Just bring it in after induction when the surgical drape is up.
 
SaltyDog said:
On a completely unrelated side note, what is it with nurses? Today I drop off a pt in the ICU and it's full of 23yo thin, blonde, attractive nurses. Got me thinking, you never see thin attractive middle aged nurses. At what point in their career do they automatically go from young and hot to old, overweight, and surly? I swear they're like asian women. They look like they're 20 till they're 50, then they look like they're 90.
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When they discover doughnuts.
 
SaltyDog said:
On a completely unrelated side note, what is it with nurses? Today I drop off a pt in the ICU and it's full of 23yo thin, blonde, attractive nurses. Got me thinking, you never see thin attractive middle aged nurses. At what point in their career do they automatically go from young and hot to old, overweight, and surly? I swear they're like asian women. They look like they're 20 till they're 50, then they look like they're 90.
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1/2 of them become trophy wives and clock out for good.
 
SaltyDog said:
Coffee is frowned upon in our OR's as well. I started running a couple lengths of K50 tubing from the travel mug in my bag up to an easily accessible location. Now I can sip away and no one's the wiser.

Coffee? What Coffee?? :ninja:😉

On a completely unrelated side note, what is it with nurses? Today I drop off a pt in the ICU and it's full of 23yo thin, blonde, attractive nurses. Got me thinking, you never see thin attractive middle aged nurses. At what point in their career do they automatically go from young and hot to old, overweight, and surly? I swear they're like asian women. They look like they're 20 till they're 50, then they look like they're 90.
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Those nurses you are looking at will retire by 28.
 
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