Surgical Teams Essay

A study was conducted to determine how well surgical teams, across 16 major medical centers, were able to carry out a new, less invasive, cardiac surgery procedure. The procedure was originally introduced in hospitals in the late 1990s, has a shorter recovery time than the conventional method, and allows for a competitive advantage for the hospitals that use it (Edmondson, Bohmer, & Pisano, 2001, p. 126). The conventional open heart operation that the surgical teams use last anywhere from two to four hours, and were a “. . . well-defined sequence of individual tasks that constitute an operation becomes so routine that team members often don’t need words to signal the start of a new stage in the procedure; a mere look is enough” (Edmondson, Bohmer, & Pisano, 2001, p. 126). Teams who have been working together had already found a rhythm with one another and knew their roles; however, they would need to learn to use new technologies and processes to improve their performance as a team. …show more content…
Where the conventional open heart surgery allowed for the team members to be more independent in their tasks and professions, the new procedure and technology required, “. . . a greater interdependence and communication among team members” (Edmondson, Bohmer, & Pisano, 2001, p. 127). As with anything new process, there is a learning curve that is expected, and in some cases, things will get worse before they get better (Edmondson, Bohmer, & Pisano, 2001, p. 125). The learning curve is attributable to the team learning to adapt to their new roles, using new equipment, and performing new tasks. All of the teams increased their speed initially due to repeating the procedures, which underscored one of the key principles of learning, that the more you perform an activity, the better the results will be (Edmondson, Bohmer, & Pisano, 2001, p.