An Expanded Preoperative Component within an Enhanced Recovery Protocol Improves Outcomes in Colorectal Surgery.

Enhanced Recovery Protocols (ERPs) have been shown to lead to quicker recovery in colorectal surgery, with reduced postoperative length of stay (LOS). ERPs could potentially be improved with an expanded preoperative component reflecting current evidence. We hypothesize that an ERP with an expanded preoperative component will reduce LOS consistent with or exceeding that seen with traditional ERPs. Our ERP was implemented in June of 2014. Data was collected for two full years from July 2014 through June 2016. The protocol was employed in colorectal cases, both elective and emergent. Data from ERP cases were compared with contemporaneous controls that did not go through the ERP. Patients who underwent colorectal procedures and participated in the ERP with the expanded preoperative component had an average LOS of 5.33 days, whereas controls stayed for an average of 7.93 days (P value, <0.01). ERP cases also experienced fewer readmissions and complications, although statistical significance could not be established. The results demonstrate that an ERP with an enhanced preoperative component significantly reduces LOS and potentially decreases the rate of readmissions and total complications.

Contact Isolation Precautions in Trauma Patients: An Analysis of Infectious Complications.

BACKGROUND: Victims of traumatic injuries represent a population at risk for a wide variety of complications. Contact isolation (CI) is a set of restrictions designed to help prevent the transmission of medically significant organisms in the healthcare setting. A growing body of literature demonstrates that CI can have significant implications for the individual isolated patient. Our goal was to characterize the use of contact isolation at our Level I trauma center and investigate the association of CI with infectious complications. PATIENTS AND METHODS: An existing trauma database containing data on patients admitted at our Level I trauma center between January 1, 2011 and December 31, 2012, along with their contact isolation status, was queried. Demographics, injuries, and the presence of infections were collected. Diagnosis of pneumonia or UTI was based on clinical documentation in the patient's medical record. A chart review was performed to ascertain the reason for CI including specific organisms. Because of differences in patient demographics between the CI and non-CI groups, linear regression was performed to adjust for the effects of different variables. RESULTS: A total of 4,423 patients were admitted over this period. Of these, 4,318 (97.6%) had complete records and were included in the subsequent analysis. The CI was in place in 249 (5.8%) patients; 4,069 (94.2%) were not isolated. The number who had CI initiated for MRSA nasal colonization was 173 (69.5%). Twenty-two (8.9%) had no reason for CI documented. Pneumonia occurred in 190 (4.4%), 54 (21.7) in the CI group versus 136 (3.3%) in the non-CI group. Urinary tract infection (UTI) was diagnosed in 166 (3.8%), 48 (19.3%) in the CI group versus 118 (2.9%) in the non-CI group. Using logistic regression and excluding patients placed on contact isolation for the development of a new resistant nosocomial infection, CI, Injury Severity Score, gender, length of stay, and mechanical ventilation were identified as common covariates for pneumonia (PNA) and UTI. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease COPD was specifically identified for PNA. Spinal cord injury, vertebral column injury and pelvic-urogenital injury were also significant for UTI. CONCLUSIONS: The development of pneumonia and UTI in patients with trauma was significantly associated with the use of CI. Because the majority of these patients had CI precautions in place for asymptomatic colonization, the CI provided them no direct benefit. Because the use of CI is associated with multiple negative outcomes, its use in the trauma population needs to be carefully re-evaluated.

Perioperative Statin Treatment: Can It Decrease Postsurgical Cardiac Event Risk in Noncardiac Surgery?

Cardiac events are an important cause of postsurgical morbidity and mortality. Statin drugs have been studied as potentially risk-modifying agents in perioperative medicine. They have been shown to confer a protective benefit in cardiac surgery, but the evidence available in noncardiac surgery patient populations remains less conclusive. We hypothesized that perioperative statin treatment would be associated with lower incidence of postsurgical cardiac events (PSCEs) after major noncardiac surgery. A retrospective cohort study included 21,637 major noncardiac surgeries. Statin treatment was the exposure of interest and PSCE was the primary outcome measure. Data collection included patient age, body mass index, smoking status, diabetic status, cardiac event history, statin treatment history, and PSCE diagnoses. Perioperative statin treatment occurred in 4176 cases (19.3%). PSCEs occurred in 50 cases (0.23%), 29 in the untreated control group (0.17%) and 21 in the statin treatment group (0.50%). Relative risk in the untreated group was 0.3303 (95% confidence interval = 0.1886, 0.5786). This implied that statin-treated patients had higher risk than the untreated group. However, a logistic regression model that accounted for observed cardiac disease risk factors showed statin treatment not to be a significant predictor of PSCE in this sample. Analysis repeated in high-risk subsets of the cohort yielded similar results. A propensity score matching method that minimized differences between study groups also failed to demonstrate a significant association between statin treatment and PSCE risk. Our study did not demonstrate a significant association between perioperative statin treatment and PSCEs after major noncardiac surgery.

Potential return on investment for implementation of perioperative goal-directed fluid therapy in major surgery: a nationwide database study.

BACKGROUND: Preventable postsurgical complications are increasingly recognized as a major clinical and economic burden. A recent meta-analysis showed a 17-29 % decrease in postoperative morbidity with goal-directed fluid therapy. Our objective was to estimate the potential economic impact of perioperative goal-directed fluid therapy. METHODS: We studied 204,680 adult patients from 541 US hospitals who had a major non-cardiac surgical procedure between January 2011 and June 2013. Hospital costs (including 30-day readmission costs) in patients with and without complications were extracted from the Premier Inc. research database, and potential cost-savings associated with a 17-29 % decrease in postoperative morbidity were estimated. RESULTS: A total of 76,807 patients developed one or more postsurgical complications (morbidity rate 37.5 %). In patients with and without complications, hospital costs were US$27,607 ± 32,788 and US$15,783 ± 12,282 (p < 0.0001), respectively. Morbidity rate was anticipated to decrease to 26.6-31.1 % with goal-directed fluid therapy, yielding potential gross cost-savings of US$153-263 million for the study period, US$61-105 million per year, or US$754-1286 per patient. Potential savings per patient were highly variable from one surgical procedure to the other, ranging from US$354-604 for femur and hip-fracture repair to US$3515-5996 for esophagectomies. When taking into account the volume of procedures, the total potential savings per year were the most significant (US$32-55 million) for colectomies. CONCLUSIONS: Postsurgical complications occurred in more than one third of our study population and had a dramatic impact on hospital costs. With goal-directed fluid therapy, potential cost-savings per patient were US$754-1286. The highest cost-savings per year were observed for colectomies. These projections should help hospitals estimate the return on investment when considering the implementation of goal-directed fluid therapy.

Contact isolation is a risk factor for venous thromboembolism in trauma patients.

BACKGROUND: Contact isolation (CI) is a series of precautions used to prevent the transmission of medically significant infectious pathogens in the health care setting. Our institution's implementation of CI includes limiting patient movement to the assigned room. Our objective was to define the association between CI and venous thromboembolism (VTE) at our Level I trauma center. METHODS: Our institution's prospective trauma database was retrospectively queried for all patients admitted to the trauma service between January 1, 2011, and December 31, 2012. Data including demographics, Injury Severity Score (ISS), preexisting medical conditions, injury type, and VTE development were collected. CI status data were obtained from our institution's infection control database. χ2 was used to examine the unadjusted relationship between CI status and VTE. As the groups were not equivalent, logistic regression was then used to examine the relationship between CI and VTE while adjusting for relevant covariates including sex, age, ISS, and comorbidities. RESULTS: Of the 4,423 trauma patients admitted during the study period, 4,318 (97.6%) had complete records and were included in subsequent analyses. A total of 249 (5.8%) of the patients were on CI. VTE occurred in 44 patients (17.7%) on CI versus 141 patients (3.5%) who were not isolated (p < 0.0001; odds ratio, 6.0; 95% confidence interval, 4.1-8.6). With the use of lasso [least absolute shrinkage and selection operator] regression to adjust for patient risk factors, this relationship remained highly significant (p < 0.0001; odds ratio, 2.61; 95% confidence interval, 1.7-4.0). CONCLUSION: CI, ISS, hospital length of stay, and cardiac comorbidity were associated with VTE. After adjustment for other risk factors, CI remained most strongly associated with VTE. Although any medical intervention may come with unintended consequences, the risks and benefits of CI in this population need to be reevaluated. Further study is planned to identify opportunities to mitigate this increased VTE risk. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Prognostic/epidemiologic study, level III; therapeutic study, level IV.

Higher surgical critical care staffing levels are associated with improved National Surgical Quality Improvement Program quality measures.

BACKGROUND: The changing face of American health care demands careful scrutiny of resource allocation. The impact of the surgical intensivist model on general surgical quality measures has not been studied. Our objective was to investigate the relationship between surgical critical care staffing and indicators of general surgical quality measured by the National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (NSQIP). METHODS: We retrospectively examined the number of attending surgical intensivists at our tertiary care center biannually from January 2008 through June 2012. Risk-adjusted indicators of general surgical quality were captured and reported semiannually by NSQIP. Mortality, overall morbidity, patients on ventilator for more than 48 hours, unplanned intubations, and venous thromboembolism were included. Student's t test was used to compare the staffing levels and associated NSQIP odds ratios of a 3-year control period of full commitment with a 2-year period following significant provider attrition. RESULTS: The number of full-time surgical intensivists ranged from 2 to 8, with a period of rapid decline in late 2010 to early 2011 followed by slow recovery. There was a mean of 6.6 surgical intensivists during the 3 years before the decline and a mean of 4 in the 2 years after the decline and recovery (p < 0.005). This period of decline was associated with a significant increase in the odds ratio of ventilation for more than 48 hours (before, 0.936; after, 1.87; p = 0.0086) and of venous thromboembolism (before, 0.844; after 1.43; p = 0.0268). A trend in increased unplanned intubations was also observed. Overall morbidity and mortality were not affected. Notably, quality indicators seemed to rapidly approach baseline levels as new surgical intensivists were recruited. CONCLUSION: Institutional commitment to recruitment and retention of a surgical critical care team leads to improved NSQIP general surgery quality measures. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Care management study, level IV.

Effects of computerized decision support systems on blood glucose regulation in critically ill surgical patients.

BACKGROUND: The use of computerized decision support systems (CDSS) in glucose control for critically ill surgical patients has been reported in both diabetic and nondiabetic patients. Prospective studies evaluating its effect on glucose control are, however, lacking. The objective of this study was to evaluate patient-specific computerized IV insulin dosing on blood glucose levels (BGLs) by comparing patients treated pre-CDSS with those treated post-CDSS. STUDY DESIGN: A prospective study was performed in 4 surgical ICUs and 1 progressive care unit comparing patient data pre- and post-implementation of CDSS. The primary outcomes measures were the impact of the CDSS on glycemic control in this population and on reducing the incidence of severe hypoglycemia. RESULTS: Data on 1,682 patient admissions were evaluated, which corresponded to 73,290 BGLs post-CDSS compared with 44,972 BGLs pre-CDSS. The percentage of hyperglycemic events improved, with BGLs of >150 mg/dL decreasing by 50% compared with 6-month historical controls during the 18-month study period from July 2010 through December 2011. This was true for all 5 units individually (p < 0.0001, by one sample sign test). In addition, severe hypoglycemia (defined as BGL <40 mg/dL) decreased from 1% to 0.05% after implementing CDSS (p < 0.0001 by 2-sided binomial test). CONCLUSIONS: Patients whose BGLs were managed using CDSS were statistically significantly more likely to have a glucose reading under control (<150 mg/dL) than in the 6-month historical controls and to avoid serious hypoglycemia (p < 0.0001).