The nature of anaesthetists’ training and experience makes them uniquely qualifi ed to assess the inherent risks of giving an anaesthetic. Ideally, every patient should be seen by an anaesthetist prior to surgery in order to identify, manage, and minimize these risks. Traditionally, this occurred when the patient was admitted, usually the day before an elective surgical procedure. However, if a...

PURPOSE Popular beliefs exert an impact of lunar phases on elective surgery. The aim of our study was to evaluate potential correlations between complications in cataract surgery and the phases of the moon during its passage through the zodiac and Fridays that fall on the 13th. METHODS Patients with complications during cataract surgery were extracted retrospectively from the clinical databas...

INTRODUCTION The aims of this study were as follows: first to quantify and review the types of surgical procedures performed by military surgeons assigned to a Forward Surgical Team (FST) providing medical support to the population (MSP) in the Ivory Coast (IC), and second to analyze how this MSP was achieved. METHODS Between 2002 and 2012, all of the local nationals operated on by the differ...

BACKGROUND Wide small-area variations in the rates of elective surgical procedures and lack of systematic outcome measurement have raised questions about the appropriateness of such surgery. Our objective was to determine the feasibility of routine evaluation of indications for and outcomes of elective surgery. METHODS Participants consisted of 138 surgeons and 5313 patients who underwent 1 o...

Pre-operative assessment is required prior to the majority of elective surgical procedures, primarily to ensure that the patient is fit to undergo surgery, whilst identifying issues that may need to be dealt with by the surgical or anaesthetic teams. The post-operative management of elective surgical patients begins during the peri-operative period and involves several health professionals. App...

BACKGROUND Aim of this study was to identify factors associated with patients using the internet to find information about their upcoming surgery in general, and more specifically about anaesthesia. METHODS With Ethics committee approval, 1000 consecutive patients seen before elective surgery in the anaesthesia preoperative clinic of a Swiss Level 2 hospital were asked to complete a questionn...

Increasing emergency admissions place significant demands on limited hospital resources. We assessed national practices and resources for initiatives to reduce length of stay (LOS) and thereby improve efficiency of resource utilisation. Consultant members of the Irish Association of Coloproctology received a questionnaire seeking information about available initiatives aimed at reducing LOS. 20...

In many patients, a 'type and screen' procedure is routinely performed before surgery. However, most patients are not transfused after all. Can we predict, which surgical patients will and will not be transfused, to reduce the number of these investigations? We studied 1482 consecutive surgical patients with intermediate risk for transfusion. Multivariate logistic regression modelling and the a...

PURPOSE Based in a hospital serving one of the most deprived areas in the United Kingdom (UK), we aimed to investigate, using the Indices of Deprivation 2010, the hypothesis that deprivation affects the stage and mode of presentation of colorectal cancer. METHODS All newly diagnosed patients with colorectal cancer presenting to a District General Hospital in the UK between January 2010 and De...

Following elective surgical procedures, hospital discharge summaries are essential in the handover to primary care. The information provided varies between institutions and is highly user-dependent. Various interventions have focused on improving information transfer to patients and primary care physicians including the development of electronic templates, electronic transmission to primary car...