Radio-frequency identification of surgical sponges in the abdominal cavity of pigs

BACKGROUND Counting the sponges is an important step in surgical procedures. A miscount may impact the patient's health, and it also has legal implications for the surgeon. This is an experimental study evaluating radio-frequency technology used in the perioperative period to identify surgical sponges left in the peritoneal cavity of swine. METHODS Radio-frequency labeled-disc identification tags were sewn into 40 surgical towels. Twenty labels had the ability to emit radio-frequency waves, and 20 labels were inert to radio-frequency identification. Twenty adult pigs that underwent laparotomy and randomly received two surgical sponges were scanned by a radio-frequency identification antenna. RESULTS This method presented a positive predictive value of 100% and 100% specificity and sensitivity, as all of the tagged surgical sponges were detected. CONCLUSION Radio-frequency identification has been proved to be a useful method for the identification of surgical sponges within the abdominal cavities of swine.