Developing an Atlas to Teach Nurses to Clean Micro-instruments Used in Cataract Surgery: Effect on Patient Safety

Aims and objectives The purpose of this study was to develop an atlas to explore the effect of micro-instrument cleaning on the safety of cataract surgery.

Background Cataract surgery safety is affected by many factors, the most influential of which is the quality of instrument cleaning. Previous studies focused on the reaction in the eye after cataract surgery. None offered a solution for manually cleaning ophthalmic micro-instruments or response data for surgical instruments after cataract surgery.

Design The study was designed to collect quantitative data derived from postoperative ocular evaluation.

Methods We developed an atlas that details micro-instrument cleaning that could be used to train nurses to have this skill. A total of 120 cataract patients were divided evenly into experimental and control groups. In the experimental group, cataract surgery was undertaken using microsurgical instruments that were cleaned by the atlas-trained nurses. In the control group, micro-instruments were used that had been cleaned by non-atlas-trained nurses. All the patients underwent the same postoperative tests: anterior chamber cell counts and visual and intraocular pressures on postoperative days (PODs) 1, 3, 7, and 14.