The Courier & Advertiser (Perth and Perthshire Edition)
NHS worker puts on thinking cap for neat idea in operating theatres
An idea from one NHS Fife worker has sparked a new initiative to help patients going into theatre for an operation.
Lindsay Quinn, an operating department practitioner based at Queen Margaret Hospital in Dunfermline, suggested staff be given personalised caps during operations after learning of similar initiatives elsewhere.
Lindsay received £20,000 from Fife Health Charity to fund the project and now 450 theatre staff have been issued with the caps which feature their name and title.
She said: “The project started out quite small and we intended just to try the idea in a single theatre. We quickly realised that a really simple little thing like this could benefit all the theatres in Fife and so it quickly grew from there.
“We’ve now provided caps to staff working in planned care, obstetrics
and orthopaedics and as a clinical team I think you can really see how it improves communication, not only between staff but between ourselves and patients too.
“I think that’s really important as it’s an anxious time having surgery and so anything we can do to alleviate that anxiety is good for patients.
NHS Fife director of
acute services, Claire Dobson, added: “We’re constantly looking at how we can adapt the way we are doing things and very often this is focused on large-scale service changes.
“Sometimes, however, it is small changes like the introduction of our theatre caps which make all the difference to patients.”