Caracterización de los patrones de comunicación en salas de cirugía, durante procedimientos en un hospital de tercer nivel

Introduction. There exists special concern about the patterns of communication in the operating rooms, given their impact on patient outcome and on the relationships among the working groups interacting in this scenery. Materials and methods. This is an observational study with real time registry of the failure of communication in the course of surgical procedures in the different specialties and different degrees of complexity. Statistical analysis of the frequency of the most common errors and ethnographic analysis characterizing the types of miscommunication were completed. Results. Real time observation and registry of 179 communication failures in 35 surgical procedures, 17% high complexity, low complexity 40% and median complexity 43%; 80% occurred at noon time and 60% in the afternoon; general anesthesia was used in 60% of cases, spinal anesthesia in 20%. In 92% of cases at least, a resident was present; in 54% failure was due to the receptor, 84,3% occurred during surgery, and more than three failures in the same procedure occurred in 71,5% of the surgical procedures. Discussion. There are several variables and factors that affect the communication process and the operating rooms are especially prone to errors considering the type of activity that takes place there. Identifying the different patterns of failure in communication permits generating actions to diminish their impact on patient morbidity and mortality that may result from miscommunication.