Practicalities and costs of adhesions

Area of Science:

• Surgery
• Medical Economics
• Patient Safety

Background:

• Postoperative adhesions are a frequent complication, but routine use of anti-adhesion products remains low.
• There is a reluctance among healthcare practitioners to actively engage in adhesion prevention strategies.

Purpose of the Study:

• To compare the incidence of adhesions with other conditions to determine the level of risk.
• To describe the health economics surrounding adhesion-related disease.
• To advocate for a more proactive approach to adhesion prevention by healthcare practitioners.

Main Methods:

• The SCAR project identified the risk of adhesion-related disease.
• Risk of adhesion-related disease was compared with published risks of other common clinical situations.
• An economic model was revised using 2006 costs to analyze financial implications.

Main Results:

• The SCAR data indicates a 9.4% risk of re-admission over 5 years in specific patient groups.
• Informed consent processes frequently omit adhesion risk information (<15% of cases).
• Legal precedent suggests risks exceeding 2% necessitate inclusion in consent, with failure potentially constituting negligence.

Conclusions:

• Adhesion risk is sufficiently high to warrant inclusion in the patient consent process.
• Failure to inform patients and implement preventative treatments for adhesions has significant financial repercussions for healthcare systems.
• Proactive adhesion prevention strategies are crucial for mitigating patient risk and reducing healthcare costs.