THE ROLE OF THE RECOVERY ROOM

In a relatively short period of time, operating departments have progressed from providing very little postoperative care to having specially designed recovery rooms. Similarly, in the past, staff were not specifically trained for the role but now there is an increasing trend for permanent staff to possess relevant postbasic qualifications. Recovery staff are trained to observe and monitor patients closely during this early postsurgical period and to take prompt and appropriate action to prevent and/or treat postanaesthetic or postoperative complications. The Royal Colleges of Anaesthesia and Surgery insist on a fully functional recovery area whenever patients are in theatre. Failure to achieve this requirement may well result in the withdrawal of training approval for doctors and nonmedical professionals.

The purpose of the recovery room is to provide a calm, quiet environment, where patients are allowed and assisted to recover from the effects of general, regional or local anaesthesia and surgery. At the end of the recovery period they will be ready to be safely transferred to a surgical ward, where relatively less supervision is required. How long patients remain in the recovery room is unpredictable but it must be at least until they are physiologically and surgically stable. The average length of stay may be 30 minutes to one hour but even comparatively minor operations may result in prolonged recovery periods of several hours because of anaesthetic or surgical problems, which may be due to the type of surgery or anaesthesia or the patient's preexisting condition.

These problems may be predictable or unexpected and patients recovering from surgery therefore have many different needs. It is for this reason that some hospitals have a high dependency unit (HDU) attached to the theatre suite. Patients may be kept in the HDU for several hours (and may also be mechanically ventilated) under expert supervision until they are fit to return to the surgical ward. In this way overnight or short-term admissions to the hospital intensive care unit may be reduced.

The recovery room is designed with several bays orbed spaces, all of which are arranged and prepared in a similar way.