[Operating room management in a tertiary care center before and during the COVID-19 pandemic]

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic led to significant restrictions in surgical services.

To investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic over 3 years on surgical case volume and operating room (OR) efficiency in a tertiary care hospital.

From 1 January 2019 to 31 July 2022, the use of 6 ORs was analyzed for the first 7 months of each year (January-July), limited to regular daytime hours (8:00-16:00) from Monday to Friday. Key metrics included the number of surgeries, surgical utilization time, turnover time, start time and end time. Additionally, the number of inpatients with confirmed COVID-19 was documented. In total, 10,193 consecutive procedures were evaluated.

Compared to 2019, the number of surgeries decreased by 14.9% in 2020, 23.1% in 2021, and 16.7% in 2022. Surgical utilization time declined by 13.7% in 2020, 20.8% in 2021, and 13.5% in 2022. Turnover time and operating time per procedure significantly increased. The OR start times were significantly delayed, while end times occurred earlier. A significant inverse correlation was found between the number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients and surgical volume (p = 0.002). For each additional COVID-19 inpatient, surgical utilization time decreased by an average of 172.99 min (p < 0.001) and the delay in daily start time increased on average by 46.79 min per month (p = 0.000).

The COVID-19 pandemic led to a sustained reduction in surgical case volume, decreased OR utilization and increased turnover times through 2022 in a tertiary care center, affecting vascular, visceral and trauma surgery.