Day-surgery, one-day surgery: the experience of an ENT unit in a 250 bed hospital

The increasing trend in day-surgery procedures, resulting from continuous improvement in medical practice as well as cultural and economic factors, has profoundly changed the management of patient hospitalisation. Improvement in organizational and professional skills of health staff is essential for this procedure which allows mean hospitalisation time to be reduced. A retrospective study on personal experience of day-surgery procedures from 1st January 2002 to 31st December 2004 is herewith presented. The study comprises 1077 patients (74.2%) out of 1452 hospitalisations for programmed surgery in this period. Re-conversion rate of day-surgery hospitalisation reached 0.5%, while re-admissions within one month reached 2.5% and referred to late post-tonsillectomy haemorrhage in all 27 cases. The Authors highlight the importance of communication for an active and responsible involvement of the patients: the human factor is an indispensable quality for the good outcome of the procedure.