[Incidence of postoperative adverse events in a tertiary hospital]

To determine the proportion of reoperations, mortality, incidence, severity and degree of preventability of postoperative adverse events (PAE) in a teaching hospital.

Retrospective review a random sample of 350 surgical interventions realized in 2009 in patients over 14 years. To identify PAE, determine its severity and its degree of preventability, we used a previous classification.

Were detected PAE 113 in 61 patients, 17.4% of the 350 patients studied. 4.3% of patients were reoperated and mortality at 30 days was 2.6%. The most frequent PAE were: infection of surgical wound (15,0%), hematoma or hemorrhage of wound (9,7%) and anemia for bled (8,8%). The factors associated with the patients who acquire a PAE were the use general anesthesia, ASA>3, average stay, average age and more complex surgical services. About 70% of CP were included in the discharge report. The 72.6% of PAE were classified as mild in severity, 11.5% of moderate severity and 15.9% as very serious. 39,9% of the PAE had a high probability of having been avoided. One did not find relation between the preventability and the gravity of the PAE.

The high proportion of patients surgically operated with PAE, the consequent reoperations and the mortality in the post operatory immediate indicates the importance of implementing actions to reduce the magnitude and impact of these adverse events, especially considering that over 40% of same could be avoided.