[Outpatient ENT surgery in a district hospital]

Our experience in out-patient surgery from October 1994 to July 1996 is reported. Patients were selected using anesthesiology criteria (anesthetic risk I or II, psychosocial criteria, operation time less that 1 h 30 min, age > 6 years). One hundred seventy-eight patients underwent surgery: 61 direct suspension laryngoscopy, 50 adenoidectomy, 48 septoplasty, 10 functional endoscopic sinus surgery, 8 myringotomy, and 1 nasal decortication. Fourteen patients (7.86%) required hospital admission. No patients required ENT care in the first 24 hours after release from the Ambulatory Surgery Unit.