BioScience Laboratories, Inc. is very pleased to announce that one of our Principal Investigators, Russell Griggs, M.S., will be presenting a poster at this year’s AORN Conference in Anaheim, CA, April 2–6, 2016. The poster session will be April 4, from 12 p.m. – 1 p.m. We hope you can stop by and talk to Russell about his poster and how BSLI can help you with your testing needs. Below is a brief overview of the poster Russell will be presenting at the AORN Conference:
The Association of periOperative Registered Nurses (AORN) guidelines for perioperative practice recommends that when hair removal is required, it should be performed on the day of the surgical procedure using an electric clipper, in a location outside the OR/procedure room. Additionally, the guidelines recommend that hair removal must prevent particle dispersion.
The current practice to remove loose hair using adhesives can result in increased abrasion or irritation in some patients and is inefficient. This “clean-up” process delays perioperative skin antisepsis and draping, and disrupts the continuity of perioperative patient flow in the OR. It may also be inappropriate to clip outside of the OR depending on the body sites affected.
An innovative vacuum-assisted hair collection device that attaches to the head of the electric clipper eliminates this “clean-up” process following hair clipping. After following informed consent procedures, 18 male subjects were clipped and assessed using this hair collection device. The subjects’ chest and groin were randomized for hair removal, using the vacuum-assisted device attached to the head of conventional electric clippers, when compared to using surgical tape. The results documented that use of vacuum-assisted hair removal technology significantly reduced the amount of microbial dispersion (contamination) produced during the standard clipping process. Surgical tape used to remove clipped hair has been shown to disperse 10^3 to 10^4 CFU viable microbial particles within the planned operative field. Furthermore, use of this vacuum-assisted technology to capture residual hair post clipping was effective in reducing the time required for “clean-up” of dispersed hair particles following traditional clipping, thereby improving the continuity of perioperative patient management.