ORLANDO, FL – The latest guidelines from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommend that pediatric procedure kits be standardized to include sterile stuffed animals like frogs, hippos, and flamingos, to name a few. The guidelines were published late last week.
“These kits have lidocaine, iodine, needles, collection bags or tubes,” explained Farrah Thorne, spokesperson for the AAP, “but you know what they’re missing? Fun! Sterile fun! As in sterile stuffed animals. ‘I’m gonna jab this needle in but look over here! Such a funny-looking ducky!'”
The idea came to pass shortly after Virginia anesthesiologist Thomas Kingston successfully demonstrated that “fun” can take place within a sterile field when he put on a puppet show for his surgical colleagues. Inspired, the AAP drafted the sterile stuffed animal guidelines, and their review was expedited and approved in high-pitched funny voices.
“The guidelines are brilliantly done,” opted pediatrician Alan Ewing. “They recommend ‘at least 1 sterile stuffed animal’ be present in each procedure kit, but they don’t specify what specific stuffed animals. We have the freedom to choose. Me? I’d love to have a huge giraffe in every pediatric LP kit. Man, that’d be one huge kit!”
To be clear, the AAP means sterile as in the stuffed animals are free from bacteria and other microorganisms, not sterile as in unable to reproduce and form offspring.
Though the new AAP recommendation does seem to be a no-brainer, there may be one drawback.
“What happens if I get ready to put a child through a painful procedure and then all of a sudden the child and I get so distracted playing with sterile stuffed pandas that we forget about the procedure?” asked pediatric nurse practitioner Eva Waters. “Actually, now that I think of it, that sounds awesome! Screw the procedures, we want pandas! PANDAS! PANDAS! PANDAS!!!”
