Mortality After Elective Surgery: The Potential Role for Preoperative Palliative Care

Preoperative optimization is increasingly emphasized for high-risk surgical patients. One critical component of this includes preoperative advanced care planning to promote goal-concordant care. We aimed to define a subset of patients that might benefit from preoperative palliative care consult for advanced care planning.

We examined adult patients admitted from January 2016 to December 2018 to a university health system for elective surgery. Multivariate logistic regression was used to identify variables associated with death within 1 y, and presence of palliative care consults preoperatively. Chi-square analysis evaluated the impact of a palliative care consult on advanced care planning variables.

Of the 29,132 inpatient elective procedures performed, there was a 2.0% mortality rate at 6 mo and 3.5% at 1 y. Those who died were more likely to be older, male, underweight (BMI <18), or have undergone an otolaryngology, neurosurgery or thoracic procedure type (all P-values < 0.05). At the time of admission, 29% had an advance directive, 90% had a documented code status, and 0.3% had a preoperative palliative care consult. Patients were more likely to have an advanced directive, a power of attorney, a documented code status, and have a do not resuscitate order if they had a palliative care consult (all P-values <0.05). The mortality rates and preoperative palliative care rates per procedure type did not follow similar trends.

Preoperative palliative care consultation before elective admissions for surgery had a significant impact on advanced care planning.