Impact of staff turnover during cardiac surgical procedures

The impact of staff turnover during cardiac procedures is unknown. Accurate inventory of sharps (needles/blades) requires attention by surgical teams, and sharp count errors result in delays, can lead to retained foreign objects, and may signify communication breakdown. We hypothesized that increased team turnover raises the likelihood of sharp count errors and may negatively affect patient outcomes. All cardiac operations performed at our institution from May 2011 to March 2016 were reviewed for sharp count errors from a prospectively maintained database. Univariate and multivariable analyses were performed. Among 7264 consecutive cardiac operations, sharp count errors occurred in 723 cases (10%). There were no retained sharps detected by x-ray in our series. Sharp count errors were lower on first start cases (7.7% vs 10.7%, P