Editor's Note In this study from the UK, researchers found a robust relationship between a surgeon’s daily OR schedule and surgical performance (indexed by duration of procedure). The researchers say surgeons should reorder their OR schedule, starting their days with the simpler cases and building up to the more difficult…

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Editor's Note Children younger than 3 years of age may benefit from 23-hour observation after tonsillectomy, this study finds. In this multicenter study of 1,817 healthy children having outpatient tonsillectomy, those younger than 3 years were at an increased risk for complications within the first 24 hours, and the complications…

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Editor's Note In patients having noncardiac surgery who develop a perioperative acute myocardial infarction (AMI), about one in three died in-hospital or were readmitted within 30 days of discharge, finds this study presented March 10 at the 2018 American College of Cardiology Annual Scientific Session. Among more than 3 million…

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Editor's Note Reductions in hospital length of stay (LOS) for surgical procedures between 2008 and 2014, were not linked to a greater use of postacute care facilities in this study. Researchers studied the relationship between decreased LOS and postacute care using summary measures from the US National Inpatient Sample with…

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Editor's Note Great strides in burn care over the past 30 years have dramatically increased burn patients’ chances of survival by 2% per year, this study finds. Between 1989 and 2017, there were 10,384 burn admissions with 355 mortalities. Researchers looked at the main factors that influenced risk of death…

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Editor's Note Surgical readmission rates have declined in the past decade, and rates of decline increased during the Hospital Readmission Reduction Program (HRRP) period, this study finds. Between 2005 and 2014, rates of readmission across 8 targeted procedures declined from 12.2% to 8.6%. Before the Affordable Care Act, rates of readmission…

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Editor's Note Using financial data from California’s short-term and specialty hospitals from FY 2005 to FY 2014, researchers from the UCLA School of Medicine provide the first standardized estimates of OR costs. The analysis, which focused on two revenue centers--surgery/recovery and ambulatory surgery--found that the mean cost of OR time…

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Editor's Note In this study to evaluate the efficiency and safety of overlapping surgery at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, researchers found that the practice does not expose patients to increased risk of negative outcomes. Of 26,260 cases analyzed for surgical time and 15,106 for outcomes, overlapping surgery patients had:…

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Editor's Note In this study, researchers found persistent differences in the surgical care of racial and ethnic minorities despite the formation of Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs), which were expected to reduce healthcare disparities and improve access to surgical services. Rates of surgical interventions in the ACO cohort were significantly lower…

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Editor's Note This analysis of 3 million elective surgical procedures in the American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (ACS NSQIP) found a broad range of procedure-specific intrinsic cardiac adverse event risks associated with 200 commonly performed procedures. A total of 66 low, 30 intermediate, and 106 high…

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