To Keep Patients Safe, Start Thinking Like One By Mary Olivera, MHA, CRCST, CHL, FCS

It is inevitable that there will come a time when each of us is a patient at the mercy of doctors, staff, and the protocols that they — not we — adhere to. As sterile processing department (SPD) professionals, we should step back from these experiences and reflect on what worked and what didn’t, how we felt as a patient during the entire treatment experience, and how we might take those lessons and apply them to our everyday interactions with our own patients and our colleagues at our facilities.