Patient falls off operating room table

[orthonurse55]

Hello all!

I read this scary article last night and thought I would get some discussion started.

http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/local/article/Suit-Woman-hurt-after-falling-off-operating-table-3577162.php

The main reason it caught my attention is that is actually happened to me once and I can honestly say it was through no fault of the hospital or those of us in the room. The patient had had a spinal anesthetic and had just had a fractured hip repaired. Anesthesia was at the head of the table and I was untying the patient from the fracture table. MD had alredy walked away, and the scrub nurse was gathering the instruments. All of a sudden, while I am at the patient's feet, she sat up, leaned over and fell off! It happened so fast I couldn't make it to the side of the bed. The bed was up about 4 feet in the air because we had just finished working on her. And of course, no side rails on a surgery table.

The patient had a small head laceration, no other injuries, thank God! She was very confused and we were so lucky that her family did not sue us. It was absolutely the worst day of my entire nursing career. And I'm talking about 20 years at that point!

[GitanoRN, BSN, MSN, RN]

i seriously doubt that the amount mentioned is accurate. in my humble opinion, no amount of compensation would suffice if we take in consideration that the injures endured by the patient are for life. therefore, she could be facing other complications in the future in relation to this fall. at this level, i sincerely hope that everyone involved as well as the readers of this article have learned a lesson regarding patient safety to prevent this unwanted publicity.

[classicdame, MSN, EdD]

we recently installed safety belts on our OR tables and in the cath lab. All it takes is one big lawsuit and those little precautions look pretty cheap.

[student987]

I had surgery once and they had to start recovering me in OR (PACU was full maybe not totally sure) I kept trying to roll over onto my side (how I always sleep). This was bad for 2 reasons 1) or tables are tiny 2) the surgery was on the right side of my face/orbital area. not sure who was there with me but someone kept saying "NO" and pushing me back down as I would try to roll over. I am usually aware as I come out of anesthisa but can not control my actions. dont really like that feeling.