Anesthesia Providers’ Perceptions of Perioperative Temperature Monitoring: A DNP Project

Abstract

Perioperative temperature monitoring is a standard of care and is important to prevent inadvertent perioperative hypothermia (IPH) and the associated increased risks. IPH is defined as a temperature of less than 36° Celsius and contributes to many negative outcomes. The purpose of this quality improvement project was to assess anesthesia providers’ perceptions of the effectiveness of their current practice for intraoperative temperature monitoring and of a newly developed intraoperative temperature monitoring and management tool. The project was structured in a PDSA format with Qualtrics surveys utilized to collect participant responses prior to and two weeks after implementation of an educational tool. Survey data from seven anesthesia providers showed positive results, but participants indicated they were unlikely to use the tool in their daily practice. Anesthesia providers using the educational tool decreased the amount of time it took to access reference material when in the perioperative setting. Overwhelmingly, anesthesia providers knew important information regarding perioperative temperature monitoring and management, including identifying core modality sites and identifying there is a standard in place governed by each institution. The project was helpful in determining anesthesia providers’ perceptions of not wanting additional resources to utilize during their daily practice, despite reporting that it proved to be useful and saved them time during their busy workday. Future suggestions include repeating this project on a larger scale to obtain more conclusive results.