Impact of an Acute Care Surgery Clinical Pathway on Patient Outcomes in Acute Appendicitis

Acute care surgery (ACS) encompasses surgical critical care, emergency general surgery, and the surgical management of trauma. Following ACS implementation at our institution, we developed a perioperative clinical pathway for acute appendicitis (AA) to improve efficiency and standardize post-operative care. The purpose of our study is to assess patient outcomes utilizing our ACS clinical pathway for patients with AA. This is a retrospective cohort study involving patients admitted to our tertiary care facility with AA who underwent appendectomy. Patients were classified by pre-implementation (January 1, 2016-July 31, 2018) and post-implementation (August 1, 2018-December 31, 2020) of our ACS clinical pathway. The primary outcome was hospital length of stay (LOS). Statistical analysis was performed using SAS with a p-value <0.05 determined as significant. Of the 492 patients included, 225 were in the pre- and 267 were in the post-implementation cohorts. Hospital LOS was substantially decreased in the post-implementation cohort (31.2 vs. 50.4 h, p < 0.001). The post-implementation group had a substantial decrease in computed tomography (CT) to operating room (OR) start time (6.81 vs. 11.4 h, p < 0.001), CT to antibiotic agents' administration (2.20 vs. 3.37 h, p < 0.001), inpatient opioid utilization (125 morphine equivalents [ME] vs. 172 ME, p < 0.001), and discharge antibiotic agents' prescription rates (23.6% vs. 30.7%, p = 0.077). Recovery unit discharges (20 vs. 9%, p < 0.001) were increased in the post-implementation cohort. Our ACS clinical pathway for AA resulted in earlier surgical intervention, enhanced opioid and antimicrobial stewardship, and gains in surgical care efficiencies.