[Surgical and anesthetic mortality in Mackay Memorial Hospital 1988-1989]

The mortality associated with 52128 anesthetics administered over two years (1988-1989) at Mackay Memorial Hospital, Taipei, was reported. The frequency of death to which anesthesia contributed was 0.4/10000 (2 cases in 52128 anesthetics). The total mortality rate from surgery within one week was 0.2% (105 cases in 52128 anesthetics). Anesthetic deaths were responsible for 1.9% of the total mortality. There were 25 cases of cardiac arrest with 18 fatal cases (7 cases were recovered after cardiopulmonary resuscitation). The causes of cardiac arrest during anesthesia included anesthetic factors (24%), surgical factors (24%) and patients' pathological factors (52%).