Related Experiment Video
Updated: Oct 20, 2025
Reduced Procedure Time and Variability with Active Esophageal Cooling During Radiofrequency Ablation for Atrial Fibrillation
Published on: August 25, 2022
December Is Coming: A Time Trend Analysis of Monthly Variation in Adult Elective Anesthesia Caseload across Florida
Anastasia Pozdnyakova Piersa1, Avery Tung2, Richard P Dutton3
1From the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine and Booth School of Business, Chicago, Illinois; Current Position: Department of Anesthesia, Critical Care and Pain Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts.
Background:
Anesthesia staffing models rely on predictable surgical case volumes. Previous studies have found no relationship between month of the year and surgical volume. However, seasonal events and greater use of high-deductible health insurance plans may cause U.S. patients to schedule elective surgery later in the calendar year. The hypothesis was that elective anesthesia caseloads would be higher in December than in other months.
Methods:
This review analyzed yearly adult case data in Florida and Texas locations of a multistate anesthesia practice from 2017 to 2019. To focus on elective caseload, the study excluded obstetric, weekend, and holiday cases. Time trend decomposition analysis was used with seasonal variation to assess differences between December and other months in daily caseload and their relationship to age and insurance subgroups.
Results:
A total of 3,504,394 adult cases were included in the analyses. Overall, daily caseloads increased by 2.5 ± 0.1 cases per day across the 3-yr data set. After adjusting for time trends, the average daily December caseload in 2017 was 5,039 cases (95% CI, 4,900 to 5,177), a 20% increase over the January-to-November baseline (4,196 cases; 95% CI, 4,158 to 4,235; P < 0.0001). This increase was replicated in 2018: 5,567 cases in December (95% CI, 5,434 to 5,700) versus 4,589 cases at baseline (95% CI, 4,538 to 4,641), a 21.3% increase; and in 2019: 6,103 cases in December (95% CI, 5,871 to 6,334) versus 5,045 cases at baseline (95% CI, 4,984 to 5,107), a 21% increase (both P < 0.001). The proportion of commercially insured patients and those aged 18 to 64 yr was also higher in December than in other months.
Conclusions:
In this 3-yr retrospective analysis, it was observed that, after accounting for time trends, elective anesthesia caseloads were higher in December than in other months of the year. Proportions of commercially insured and younger patients were also higher in December. When compared to previous studies finding no increase, this pattern suggests a recent shift in elective surgical scheduling behavior.
More Related Videos
05:39Author Spotlight: A Non-Intubated Video-Assisted Thoracoscopic Surgery with Multimodal Analgesia and Sevoflurane Inhalation Anesthesia
Published on: May 26, 2023
10:46A Method of Trigonometric Modelling of Seasonal Variation Demonstrated with Multiple Sclerosis Relapse Data
Published on: December 9, 2015
Related Concept Videos
01:30Current Trends in Nursing II
01:29Issues And Trends In Healthcare Delivery System
Cost Containment
Payment for healthcare services has historically promoted adoption of costly and often unnecessary or inefficient...
01:29Local Anesthetics: Clinical Application as Epidural Anesthesia
Since epidural anesthetics can be infused through an epidural catheter, all types of drugs, including short-acting ones, can be administered. Chloroprocaine and lidocaine are examples of short and long-duration anesthetics, respectively. Bupivacaine...
01:28Current Trends in Nursing I
01:24General Anesthesia: Overview
General anesthesia induces unconsciousness in the whole body, while the others target specific areas or sensations. It is administered to minimize adverse effects, maintain...
01:11Local Anesthetics: Clinical Application as Spinal Anesthesia