Ethical and Legal Considerations for Recording in the OR
Audiovisual (AV) recording is increasingly used and recommended in the operating room, although its ethical implications need clarification. The aim of this systematic review was to carefully review the published literature on the ethical aspects of AV recording in the operating room. The integration of AV recording into surgical procedures has increased interest in surgical video recording for patient care, medical education, and quality improvement and evidence. The collection, analysis, and storage of these AV records can affect operations in the operating room and pose risks to patients and surgical partners that can be identified based on ethical, legal, and privacy considerations. A qualitative literature search was conducted in PubMed according to the PRISMA (Professional Guidelines for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) guidelines. They then reviewed the manuscript reports to find articles that were not found in the initial search.
This review contained 62 articles (52 articles from the PubMed search and 10 articles from the literature search). Key issues currently affecting data include privacy, consent, ownership, lawful use and retrieval, alteration, security of paper records, and the impact of captured data on the operations team.
The objective of this review is to strengthen the debate on the ethical and legal nature of data in the operating room. This will drive change by enabling health systems to adapt to new and innovative technologies without compromising quality or patient care.
Source: Ethical and Legal Considerations for Recording in the Operating Room: A Systematic Review
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