A simple checklist that makes surgery safer

In 2007, the World Health Organization asked a team of experts to develop a solution to the problem of unsafe surgery. Led by surgeon and Harvard Chan School professor Atul Gawande, the team came up with a remarkably simple solution: a “safe surgery checklist,” similar to safety checklists used by airline pilots. The checklist contains 19 steps to be performed during vital phases of operations— before anesthesia, prior to skin incision, and before the team leaves the operating room. Steps include confirming a patient’s identity, the procedure being done, and the surgical site. Studies of the checklist’s performance have shown that it leads to dramatic improvements in surgical outcomes. A 2009 study of eight hospitals around the world found that the checklist reduced deaths and complications following surgery by more than a third. Now in use in some 100 million of the 300 million operations done worldwide each year, the checklist has prevented tens of thousands of deaths and injuries and efforts are underway to further disseminate the use of this simple yet effective intervention.