Using eye drops correctly after surgery
A simple routine for putting in eye drops at home, keeping track of doses and avoiding common mistakes.
How our theatre is prepared for a cataract list
Cleaning, sterilising and checking: what happens before the first patient of the day enters the operating theatre.
Our day-care operating theatre is used for cataract surgery on most weekday mornings. Patients see only a few minutes of it, but preparing the room takes our theatre team well over an hour before the first patient arrives. Here is what happens.
At 6.30 am, two theatre assistants clean every surface, from the floor and walls to the operating table and lamp, using the disinfectants listed in our theatre protocol. The air-handling unit has been running overnight to filter the air and keep the temperature and humidity within set limits; these readings are noted in a register each morning. Nobody enters the theatre in outside clothes or footwear.
The surgical instruments for each patient are packed in individual sets, which have been cleaned, checked and sterilised in an autoclave the day before. Each pack carries an indicator strip that changes colour only when sterilisation has completed, and the strip is pasted into the patient’s file. Single-use items, such as blades, gloves and drapes, are opened only in front of the surgeon.
Before each operation, the nurse confirms the patient’s name, the eye to be operated on and the lens power, reading them aloud against the file and the mark placed on the forehead earlier that morning. The surgeon and anaesthetist repeat the check. It takes a minute and it is never skipped. After each patient, the table is wiped down and a fresh set is opened, and at the end of the list, the whole room is cleaned again.
