Patient safety in surgical oncology: perspective from the operating room

Despite knowledge that most surgical adverse events occur in the operating room (OR), understanding of the intraoperative phase of care is incomplete; most studies measure surgical safety in terms of preoperative risk or postoperative morbidity and mortality. Because of the OR's complexity, human factors engineering provides an ideal methodology for studies of intraoperative safety. This article reviews models of error and resilience as delineated by human factors experts, correlating them to OR performance. Existing methodologies for studying intraoperative safety are then outlined, focusing on video-based observational research. Finally, specific human and system factors examined in the OR are detailed.