Vernatray wins top award for patient safety
Vernatray wins top award for patient safety
Association for Perioperative Practice (AfPP) 2010 award for Best Innovation in Patient Safety.
Vernacare's new Vernatray - a single-use anaesthetic medication safety tray - has won the Association for Perioperative Practice (AfPP) 2010 award for Best Innovation in Patient Safety.
The award celebrates a product innovation that contributes significantly to perioperative practitioners delivering safer patient care.
The Vernatray was developed by medical products manufacturer Vernacare (www.vernacare.co.uk) in partnership with NHS Innovations South West and front-line theatre practitioners to provide safer care in the hospital environment - particularly for anaesthetists and perioperative care practitioners.
It is intended to replace plastic and stainless steel trays where the medication is stored in one single compartment. The Vernatray has six individual channels to ensure the correct alignment of syringes, with larger channels for 30ml+ syringes, and has a separate storage area for ampoules and sharps. This makes it easier for clinicians to locate the correct syringe and medication, therefore reducing the risk of errors.
The single-use Vernatray, made of biodegradable pulp, also helps avoids infection risks associated with re-using plastic and stainless steel receptacles. It saves cleaning time and improves environmental performance because the vessel can be simply disposed of in clinical waste or via maceration.
The Association for Perioperative Practice stated that the majority of critical incidents in anaesthesia arise from human error. They reported 128,000 patient safety incidents from surgical specialities from October 2006 to September 2007.
Jane Kent, New Product Development Manager for Vernacare: "The Vernatray makes it easier for theatre staff to locate the relevant equipment and reduces the risk of incorrect medication being administered. It is a pulp product made from recycled newspaper, making it both robust and stable, as well as environmentally sustainable."
The Vernatray was developed to meet a critical safety need identified by theatre staff at Poole Hospital in Dorset. The need was also highlighted by many perioperative practitioners across the UK who raised concerns about the risk of medication error caused by the centuries old method of selecting syringes and ampoules using a 'pick and mix' approach.
The design was prepared with input from clinicians and a model prototype was used to gain feedback from anaesthetists. Feedback was also obtained from theatre staff at the Infection Prevention Society's Surgical Site Infection Study Days, and delegates at the 2009 AfPP exhibition.
Chris Sawyer, Business Development Manager, NHS Innovations South West, said: "The Vernatray has been designed by theatre staff for theatre staff. The original idea and thinking came from anaesthetists who identified the need to increase safety by organising medication better. Vernacare has taken their concepts to a new level and created a single-use tray that meets the safety needs of modern healthcare practice."
The new tray makes it easier to perform the Surgical Safety Checklist, following the WHO 'Safe Surgery Saves Lives' Global Patient Safety Challenge. This recommends: "Verification of the completion of an anaesthesia safety checklist is required to confirm the formal inspection of the anaesthetic equipment, medications and the patient's anaesthetic risk."
Evaluation of the Vernatray has been carried out at four UK hospitals, with 99% of clinicians reporting that they found it easier to correctly identify labels on syringes and 100% of respondents stating that the syringes were stable in the tray.
