Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis has canceled, delayed and transferred dozens of surgeries because of sterile processing issues with OR equipment, according to St. Louis-based BJC HealthCare, which operates 14 hospitals.
KMOV, an affiliate of CBS and MyNetworkTV, first reported the news. In recent weeks, the outlet received anonymous tips about Barnes-Jewish Hospital staff rejecting a significant proportion of surgical tools appearing contaminated or dirty.
The sterile processing concerns prompted the hospital to postpone and transfer dozens of surgical procedures.
“Due to our rigorous reviews and processes, there have been isolated shortages of surgical instruments available,” BJC HealthCare told Becker’s in a statement. “The shortage caused us to cancel, delay, reschedule or move the location of some surgeries. We have addressed this with affected patients and families and have apologized for the inconvenience.”
The organization said it bought more instruments and equipment and “has made modifications and improvements to resolve this matter.”
“There are more than 46,000 surgeries performed at Barnes-Jewish Hospital each year — this isolated concern has caused 0.3% of surgeries to be rescheduled,” BJC HealthCare said.
The system did not specify the number of affected surgeries, but 0.3% of 46,000 equates to 138. Hospital officials also did not provide a timeframe for the paused surgeries.
In recent years, several other U.S. hospitals have paused elective surgeries due to sterile processing issues, sometimes related to staffing shortages in those departments. Barnes-Jewish Hospital did not specify the cause of the shortage of available surgical equipment.
The Missouri Department of Health and Human Services told Becker’s it conducted an investigation at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in late December in response to a complaint, but no deficiencies were cited.
The department said it could not provide more specifics and added the “no deficiencies” finding “could be because the complaint was unfounded or the issue within the complaint was resolved prior to our inspection.”
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