ABSTRACT

World Health Organization (WHO) recommends with the motto of ‘Safe surgery saves lives’ that a surgical safety checklist be used to improve patient safety.The purpose of this systematic review was to evaluate the effect of “the WHO Surgical Safety Checklist” on surgical outcomes as well as on health care givers’ compliance toward patient safety. PubMed-Medline and CINAHL databases were searched using keywords “WHO AND Safety Checklist” and “Surgical Safety AND Checklist” to identify relevant articles. English and Turkish papers and that utilized the WHO checklist were included. Some 18 research articles were found eligible and included in the analysis. Using the checklist resulted in 0.9 to 15.4 percent reduction in morbidity rate. The reduction in mortality rate was between 0.28 and 2.3 percent in several studies. In the majority of these studies health care workers demonstrated a high compliance. Adoption of the WHO Surgical Safety Checklist in clinical practice has reduced the morbidity and mortality rates in several countries. The results of this study reveals the importance of the use of such checklists at medical centers where operating room services are offered.