AMANDA A. BUCHANAN

I am a dedicated, skilled RN with a broad range of healthcare experience in both inpatient and outpatient settings. I am a caring professional with superior communication and management skills.

• Registered Nurse, California
• CNOR
• AORN Member
• American Heart Association Healthcare Provider, CPR & AED
• ACLS

• Manager/Supervisor/Educator
• Manager of 9 room OR with 66 direct reports. Responsible for performance appraisals, scheduling, staffing methodology and hiring
• As Integration Specialist, collaboration with the quality, risk and clinical informatics departments to develop process and quality initiatives for operational readiness and TJC/CDPH site visits
• Performed as educator/clinical navigator for perioperative services developing educational curriculum, facilitating staff development and education, developing and monitoring quality improvement programs.
• Taught Perioperative Transition Nurses through AORN Periop 101
• Adjunct Instructor at College of the Canyons teaching Nursing 202, Operating Room Nursing
• Performed as Clinical Coordinator (Supervisor) in Surgical Department with direct reports, supervising Surgical Techs, Clinical Nurses, Operating Room Assistants and clerical staff. Involved in performance appraisal and staff coaching.
• Performed as Charge Nurse for inpatient clinical trials
• Operating Room Clinical Education Specialist, HMNH 9/2022 - Current
• Quality Improvement Program Development and Initiatives
• Implementation of SurgiCount adjunct counting process. Provided training to staff. Monitored usage and provided coaching to staff for continued best practice. Provided and presented data to staff to recognize improvement and encourage consistency in practice. Improved clinical practice and awareness of this patient safety issue.
• Implementation of safety measures to track intentionally retained (items) sponges (RSI) and packing for surgical patients creating standardize processes for documentation and hand-off communication. Improved communication during hand-off.
• Development of Perioperative Specific Drill schedule
• Code Blue/white
• Code Red-Fire Drills
• Malignant Hyperthermia
• Local Anesthetic Systemic Toxicity (LAST)
• Massive Transfusion
• Disaster Drills/Code Triage
• COVID-19: Facilitated the development of a process to bring COVID positive patients to the operating room in collaboration with multiple departments, clinicians and disciplines including anesthesiologists, ICU, Pre-op, PACU, GI and surgical services staff.
• Policy review and development. Collaboration with like services to develop, review and combine policies to improve house wide policies and eliminate redundancies.
• Development of job specific competencies for multiple job descriptions throughout the perioperative setting, in partnership with the education department
• OR RN
• Pre-op/PACU RN
• Pre-admission Testing RN
• Surgical Technologists
• Sterile Processing Technologists
• Equipment Technicians
• Operating Room Assistants
• Perioperative Transporters
• Perioperative Patient Care Assistants
• Anesthesia Technician
• Organization and scheduling of staff in-servicing and education for current and new equipment and products used in the perioperative setting.
• Clinical Quality Integration Initiative for Operational Readiness Program: Facilitated Development operational readiness program specific to the perioperative department in collaboration with the perioperative leadership team.
• Developed Nose-to-Toes pre-surgical cleansing protocol to improve patient care and prevent surgical site infections (SSI)
• Organization and Committee Involvement
• Nursing Policy Committee
• Nursing Standardization Committee
• Zero Harm Committee: Initiatives to improve surgical site infections SSI, CAUTI and CLABSI rates
• DAISY Committee Co-chair responsible for organizing DAISY nominee and award winner celebrations
• AORN Los Angeles Chapter member
• Clinical Experience
• Circulated and Scrubbed for Vascular, Trauma, General Adult and Pediatric, Transplant and Orthopedic Surgical Procedures
• Responsible for Quality Control during surgical procedures
• Developed educational curriculum on maintaining normothermia and prevention of unintentional hypothermia in the perioperative patient
• Participated in Quality Management project addressing Principles of Hand Washing, Sterility and Operating Room Organization
• Coordinated scheduling of surgical cases
• Responded to traumas in the Emergency Department
• Provided care to critical term and pre-term infants in a Level III NICU and Member of Neonatal Transport Team
• Participated in specialty training for Extremely Low Birth Weight infants
• Preceptor for new nurses in NICU
• Preceptor for new nurses in Operating Room
• Research/Case Management/Scholastic
• Facilitated appropriate utilization of medical services based upon current contractual agreements and appropriateness of requested services
• Actively participated in discharge planning of hospitalized patients
• Concurrent review of inpatient care
• Coordinated, planned and managed care of patients on phase II Clinical Trial Protocols for Neurosurgical and Psychiatric indications
• Collected and documented study data
• Managed reporting of serious and non-serious adverse events to sponsors, ethics committees and IRB
• Worked in collaboration with principle investigators and co-investigators to ensure appropriate and adequate data collection and patient care.
• Monitored quality assurance processes related to study protocols
• Trained clinical trial staff on study protocol requirements and patient safety standards for inpatient clinical trials
• Coordinated care of patients with complex diagnoses between different specialties
• Editor of a chapter in Alexander’s Care of the Patient in Surgery, Chapter 14, 17th edition