Had a near miss in the OR recently. Patient with same name as a different patient. Almost put the wrong artificial lens in a patient's eye, but I called out the wrong birth date during the time out, the circulating nurse caught it, spoke up, and we avoided disaster.

Lesson for young surgeons: You always run your own time out and you make sure every single person in the room is quiet and paying attention. Only sound in the room should be your voice and whatever is beeping and booping from the anesthesia machine.

The time out worked the way it was supposed to. However, ideally it should never get that far. Medicine is humbling in a lot of ways. The way mistakes can sneak through multiple checks and multiple people is one of them. Stay vigilant and always look to improve your processes.