The reasons for cancellation of urological surgery: a retrospective analysis

To identify preventable reasons for surgery being cancelled and to identify steps which may minimise their occurrence.

All cancellations of surgery in the Department of Urology, Christchurch Hospital between the dates 31 March 2008 and 11 March 2011 were retrospectively identified from minutes of the Department's weekly audit meetings. These were then assigned reasons for cancellation according to those devised by the Veterans Health Administration system1.

From 4303 total operations performed, 180 cancellations occurred over the almost-3-year study period. This equated to a cancellation rate of 4.2%.34 cases (18.9%) were due to patient factors, 66 cases (36.7%) due to work-up factors, 70 (38.9%) due to facility factors, 9 cases (5%) due to surgeon factors.

A significant proportion of the 4.2% patients cancelled were preventable. Optimisation of the preadmission process as well as elucidation of the reasons for theatre over-runs were identified as key to reducing the rate of cancellation. Measurement of cancellations in the audit meeting contributes to a low cancellation rate.