Efficacy Evaluation of the Smart Operation Room System to Elevate Air Quality and Improve Surgical Smoke Exposure in Medical Care Personnel

Background: Hospital air quality is associated with nosocomial infection and occupational hazards. The air quality was affected with air-conditioning systems, the number of people, and surgical smoke, etc., in operation rooms (ORs). Previous studies focused on chemical substances and their concentrations of surgical smoke. Few investigations evaluated the exposure risk of surgical smoke in medical personnel. Limited data are shown the optimal air change rate for different operating rooms with the optimal air quality. Our studies show that a commercial surgical smoke evacuation system and surgical masks could not totally remove and filtrate the testing smoke. Also, the disinfectants used in ORs usually produce the volatile organic compounds and spread out in the air. Therefore, it is an important public health issue to improve ORs air quality and to maintain the health and safety of medical personnel.Purpose: The purpose of this study will be to evaluate the exposure risk of surgical smoke using the urinary biomarkers concentrations in medical personnel of ORs. The efficacy of smart ORs on elevating the ORs air quality and improving the surgical smoke exposure in medical personnel of ORs will be also evaluated.Methods: The first-year project will collect 10 mL middle urine of medical personnel and administrative staffs in the ORs of a medical center in northern Taiwan. The concentrations of hippuric acid and methylhippuric acid in urine samples will be analyzed with the liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry. In the second year, the air sampling will be performed in two orthopedic surgery ORs and two neurosurgery ORs. Also, the middle urine samples before and after work will be collected from medical personnel in the four ORs for hippuric acid and methylhippuric acid analysis. In the third year, the study location will be the same with the second-year project, but those ORs will be upgraded to the smart ORs. The air sampling strategy, urine samples collection, and biomarkers analysis will be the same with those in the second-year project. Additionally, this study will collect the data such as personal characteristics and life style of medical personnel. All data will be analyzed with 23.0 version SPSS statistical software.Expected results: This project is expected to establish standard analytical methods for hippuric acid and methylhippuric acid in urine samples and to establish smart OR systems. Also, it can be expected to understand the distributions of hippuric acid and methylhippuric acid concentrations in urine samples of the medical personnel in the ORs. The dynamic air quality dataset of orthopedic surgery ORs and neurosurgery ORs will be established, and then understand the efficacy of smart OR systems intervention to elevate the air quality in ORs and to improve the exposure risk of surgical smoke in medical care personnel.

Project ID:PC10708-0957
External Project ID:MOST107-2314-B182-054