Faculty Bibliography

PURPOSE: Documenting surgical complications is limited by multiple barriers and is not fostered in the electronic health record. Tracking complications is essential for quality improvement (QI) and required for board certification. Current registry platforms do not facilitate meaningful complication reporting. We developed a novel web application that improves accuracy and reduces barriers to documenting complications. METHODS: We deployed a custom web application that allows pediatric surgeons to maintain case logs. The program includes a module for entering complication data in real time. Reminders to enter outcome data occur at key postoperative intervals to optimize recall of events. Between October 1, 2014, and March 31, 2015, frequencies of surgical complications captured by the existing hospital reporting system were compared with data aggregated by our application. RESULTS: 780 cases were captured by the web application, compared with 276 cases registered by the hospital system. We observed an increase in the capture of major complications when compared to the hospital dataset (14 events vs. 4 events). CONCLUSIONS: This web application improved real-time reporting of surgical complications, exceeding the accuracy of administrative datasets. Custom informatics solutions may help reduce barriers to self-reporting of adverse events and improve the data that presently inform pediatric surgical QI. TYPE OF STUDY: Diagnostic study/Retrospective study. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Level I

OBJECTIVE: To assess trends in utilization and perioperative outcomes of laparoscopic and open abdominal wall hernia repair. METHODS: Using the ACS-NSQIP database between 2009 and 2012, patients were identified as having an ICD-9 diagnosis of an umbilical, ventral, or incisional hernia as well as a CPT code for a laparoscopic or open abdominal wall hernia repair. A coarsened exact matching procedure was utilized to create a matched cohort to mitigate selection bias. Thirty-day outcomes analysis was done for the aggregate and matched cohorts. Subcategory analysis was performed for inpatient/outpatient status, strangulated/incarcerated hernias, initial/recurrent repairs, and hernia type (umbilical, ventral, incisional). Chi-square analysis was performed to determine the statistical significance of each comparison. RESULTS: In total, 112,074 qualifying patients were identified, 86,566 (77.24 %) open and 25,508 (22.76 %) laparoscopic. Patients undergoing laparoscopic repair were more likely to have preexisting comorbidities, but less likely to experience any postoperative morbidity (11.74 vs. 7.25 %, P < 0.0001), serious morbidity (4.55 vs. 3.02 %, P < 0.0001), or mortality (0.36 vs. 0.24 %, P = 0.0030). Creation of the matched cohort produced 17,394 patients in both the laparoscopic and open groups and resulted in a loss of advantage for the laparoscopic approach in terms of morbidity associated with umbilical hernia repairs (P = 0.0082 vs. P = 0.3172). Patients undergoing laparoscopic repair were still less likely to experience any postoperative (9.57 vs. 4.92 %, P < 0.0001) or serious morbidity (3.37 vs. 1.70 %, P < 0.0001). Hospital length of stay in the matched cohort supported initial primary repairs done by an open approach. CONCLUSION: The laparoscopic approach is used in a minority of abdominal wall hernia repairs, though utilization increased by 40 % from 2009 to 2012. The laparoscopic approach continues to be safer on many fronts, but not all, and is arguably not better for umbilical or primary hernia repairs on the basis of overall morbidity and length of stay.

Endovascular stent grafting (EVAR) is now the preferred approach to repair of abdominal aortic aneurysms for many patients. One of the most common complications associated with EVAR is the development of an endoleak, or continued flow of blood into the aneurysm sac outside the graft. Type II endoleaks, those due to retrograde flow through a branch vessel such as the inferior mesenteric artery (IMA) or a lumbar artery, are the most common. Options for treatment include transarterial embolization, translumbar embolization, and laparoscopic ligation. Embolization techniques require reintervention in approximately 20%, with less than half free from aneurysm sac growth at five years, though current evidence is insufficient to determine a clear threshold for intervention or optimal technique.[1,2]

Caustic injury of the gastrointestinal tract (GI) has remained a costly and devastating problem to the bi-modal population affected, however it has seen encouraging evolutions in its care. Caustic injury is defined as an ingested acid or base that results in a wide range of pathology in theupper GI tract, mainly the upper airway, esophagus and stomach. To yield an update on caustic injuries with succinct recent innovations in care, previously published articles, with an emphasis on more recent articles were searched for using Pubmed and MEDLINE. Major advancements in technology have improved the treatment of the acute phase of injury leading to a more uniform methodology in diagnosis, less morbid acute temporizing measures and improved staging of acute injury with the help of advancements in computed tomography and endoscopic interventions. With the advancement of endoscopy and laparoscopy, acute treatment and chronic complications of caustic injury have been reassuringly improved. Endoscopy and laparoscopy have also aided in therapeutic advancements with the implementation of endoscopic dilation of strictures and minimally invasive techniques for gastro esophageal bypasses and resections. Emerging are biochemical platforms such as bioscaffolds to promote esophageal healing and topical anti-cytotoxic agents to treat esophageal strictures. Treating caustic injury has seen recent advancements with the aid of minimally invasive diagnostic and therapeutic modalities to help in the acute and chronic phases of care as improvements in clinical outcomes with novel biocellular techniques emerging