Top 4 Strategies to Ensure OR Nurse Safety During Patient Handling

Are you experiencing wrist, shoulder, or back pain? It could be from positioning patients unsafely.

As an OR nurse, you may not always consider the severity of musculoskeletal injuries while caring for patients.  But you should. Because these injuries can cause chronic disorders of the muscles, nerves, tendons, joints, cartilage, and spinal discs. And repetitive injuries can exacerbate the pain and potentially shorten your OR nursing career.

Statistics suggest OR nurses are far more likely to suffer from musculoskeletal injuries. This isn’t surprising, given how frequently nurses are moving patients, says Shosha Beal, MSN, CNOR, CSPHA.

In her 20 years in periop practice, Beal has experienced musculoskeletal pain herself and has watched many of her colleagues battle chronic injury. She’s been working to change this in her roles as a perioperative educator at Central Maine Medical Center in Lewiston, Maine, and a consultant for a company that manufactures patient positioning technology. Her goal is two-fold: to protect her OR nurse colleagues and foster a safer positioning mindset for future nurses entering the OR.

“We put our patients first, which is why nurses remain the most trusted profession. But we need to remember that preventing injury applies to us as well. The pain we experience from on-the-job patient handling is 100 precent preventable,” she said during her recent education session at AORN’s annual conference. “When we embrace a safety mindset by using the correct practices and positioning devices, we can do both—ensure our patients are positioned safely and ensure that positioning happens without personal injury.”

We caught up with her and she broke down specific positioning risks that can cause injury while sharing the several safe handling suggestions for four risky patient positions:

Prone Position

Risks for injury:

• Transferring the patient to the edge of a stretcher
• Improper ratio of height of stretcher to OR bed height
• Turning the patient onto their side and over to prone
• Repositioning the patient’s hips to maintain proper alignment of the spine
• Lifting patient legs to position on pillows

Protective practice advice: Leverage all support mechanisms incorporated into the surgical table.

Lateral Position

Risks for injury:

• Placing the patient into supine
• Moving the patient to the edge of the OR bed to allow room for the patient to be turned onto their side
• Lifting the patient torso to place axillary positioning devices
• Lifting legs to place pillows

Protective practice advice: Use a lateral transfer device or patient slings.

Lithotomy Position

Risks for injury:

• Repositioning a patient to a lower position on the bed
• Lifting legs to place in proper alignment in leg holders
• Returning the patient to supine

Protective practice advice: Make sure there are enough team members to reposition the patient to supine and use assistive devices to safely move the patient on the bed to avoid patient and staff injuries.

Supine Position

Risks for injury:

• Positioning the patient legs
• Moving arms
• Assisting a patient into the correct position

Protective practice advice: If the patient is able to reposition themself, stand by to ensure their safety. When a patient is limited in mobility consider an air lateral transfer device, which requires less team members to move the patient and provides comfortable transfer.

When it comes to safe positioning, Beal reinforced the importance of taking the time to prioritize safety: “Have patience and advocate for safe positioning for both yourself and your patients.”

Use your Virtual Pass to get more practical advice from Beal on safe patient handling in the OR through her session "Patient First! Emphasizing the OR nurse's safety during patient handling."

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