Preoperative fasting duration and medication instruction: are we improving?

Research has shown that preoperative fasting practices commonly are much longer than national guidelines, and medication instructions are not always given to patients before surgery. After implementation of an evidence-based preoperative fasting policy and educational efforts for health care providers at one facility, a follow up project was conducted to determine whether these efforts had improved fasting practices. The project findings indicate that preoperative fasting in excess of safe minimum guidelines persists. Improvements were found in the percentage of patients receiving specific instructions about whether to take their routine medications on the morning of surgery. Continued efforts must be made to implement best practices for preoperative fasting.