title: Glove failure in elective thyroid surgery: A prospective randomized study.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To analyze perforation rate in sterile gloves used by surgeons in the operating theatre of the Department of Endocrinological and General Surgery of Medical University of Lodz.
  
  
  METHODS
  Randomized and controlled trial. This study analyses the incidents of tears in sterile surgical gloves used by surgeons during operations on 3 types of thyroid diseases according to the 10th revision of International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD-10) codes. Nine hundred seventy-two pairs (sets) of gloves were collected from 321 surgical procedures. All gloves were tested immediately following surgery using the water leak test (EN455-1) to detect leakage.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Glove perforation was detected in 89 of 972 glove sets (9.2%). Statistically relevant more often glove tears occurred in operator than the 1st assistant (p < 0.001). The sites of perforation were localized mostly on the middle finger of the non-dominant hand (22.5%), and the non-dominant ring finger (17.9%).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This study has proved that the role performed by the surgeon during the procedure (operator, 1st assistant) has significant influence on the risk of glove perforations. Nearly 90% of glove perforations are unnoticed during surgery.
authors.affiliation: Medical University of Lodz, Łódź, Poland (Department of Emergency Medicine and Disaster Medicine),. sor55@wp.pl.
authors.forename: Dariusz
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Timler
authors.affiliation: Medical University of Lodz, Łódź, Poland (Department of Endocrinological, General and Oncological Surgery).
authors.forename: Michał
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kusiński
authors.affiliation: Medical University of Lodz, Łódź, Poland (Department of Health Care Policy).
authors.forename: Petre
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Iltchev
authors.affiliation: Institute of Cardiology, Warszawa, Poland (Department of Cardiosurgery and Transplantology).
authors.forename: Łukasz
authors.initials: Ł
authors.lastname: Szarpak
authors.affiliation: Medical University of Lodz, Łódź, Poland (Faculty of Health Sciences).
authors.forename: Andrzej
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Śliwczyński
authors.affiliation: Medical University of Lodz, Łódź, Poland (Department of Endocrinological, General and Oncological Surgery).
authors.forename: Krzysztof
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kuzdak
authors.affiliation: Medical University of Lodz, Łódź, Poland (Department of Medical Standards, Procedures and Quality).
authors.forename: Michał
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Marczak
mesh_terms: D017558:Elective Surgical Procedures / Q000295:instrumentation*; D004868:Equipment Failure; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D005932:Gloves, Surgical / Q000592:standards*; D006801:Humans; D016273:Occupational Exposure / Q000009:adverse effects*; D011446:Prospective Studies; D018570:Risk Assessment / Q000379:methods*; D066231:Surgeons; D013961:Thyroid Gland / Q000601:surgery*; D013965:Thyroidectomy / Q000295:instrumentation*
keywords: elective surgery; glove failure; surgeon; surgical gloves; thyroid surgery; thyroidectomy