Jon P. Ver Halen

Cranioplasty with subcutaneously preserved autologous bone grafts

Background: The efficacy of reconstructing a cranial defect with the craniectomy bone graft (bone flap) banked in a subcutaneous pocket of the abdominal wall after emergency decompressive craniotomy was evaluated. Methods: A retrospective study was performed on 53 of 65 consecutive patients who underwent emergency decompressive craniectomy and bone graft placement in the abdominal wall and survived to graft replacement. Clinical outcome after graft replacement was determined by the adequacy of the recovered craniectomy graft to achieve satisfactory reconstruction, the incidence of infection and the need for revisional surgery. Results: Forty-nine of the 53 patients (92 percent) in whom delayed autogenous graft replacement was attempted achieved a satisfactory one-stage reconstruction. In 42 of these 49 patients, autogenous graft replacement alone was performed. In eight patients it was necessary to supplement the graft with alloplastic material to achieve desired contour. One patient who underwent reconstruction with the autogenous bone graft alone, underwent late revision cranioplasty to improve contour. There were three infections. One graft was found infected in the abdominal pocket at retrieval. Two were lost to operative infection after graft replacement. Histology of two stored grafts performed after abdominal pocket retrieval demonstrated a mixture of necrotic and newly formed woven bone. A bone scan performed 1 year after graft replacement showed radionuclide activity of the graft almost identical to that of intact neighboring bone. Conclusions: Subcutaneous storage preserves viability of portions of autogenous bone grafts. Cranioplasty performed with a subcutaneously preserved craniectomy graft has a low revision rate.

Predictors of readmission after breast reconstruction: a multi-institutional analysis of 5012 patients.

BackgroundRecent health care legislation institutes penalties for surgical readmissions secondary to complications. There is a paucity of evidence describing risk factors for readmission after breast reconstruction procedures. MethodsPatients undergoing breast reconstruction in 2011 were identified in the National Surgical Quality Improvement Program database. Patients were grouped as purely immediate implant/tissue-expander reconstructions or purely autologous reconstruction for analysis. Reconstructions involving multiple types of procedures were excluded due to difficulty with classification. Perioperative variables were analyzed using &khgr;2 and Student t test as appropriate. Multivariate regression modeling was used to identify risk factors for readmission. ResultsOf 5012 patients meeting inclusion criteria, 3960 and 1052 underwent implant/expander and autologous reconstructions, respectively. Implant/expander and autologous cohorts experienced similar readmission rates (4.34% vs 5.32%, respectively; P = 0.18). However, autologous reconstructions experienced a higher rate of overall complications than implant/expander reconstructions (19.96% vs 5.86%, respectively; P < 0.05), as well as higher rates of reoperation (9.7% vs 6.5%, respectively; P < 0.05). Common predictors of readmission for implant/expander and autologous cohorts included operative time, American Society of Anesthesiologist class 3 and 4, and superficial surgical site infection. Smoking, sepsis, deep wound infection, organ space infection, and wound disruption were predictive of readmission for implant/expander reconstruction only, whereas hypertension was predictive of readmission after autologous reconstruction only. ConclusionsThis is the first study of readmission rates after breast reconstruction. Knowledge of specific risk factors for readmission may improve patient outcomes, steer strategies for optimizing reconstructive outcomes, and minimize readmissions.

Predictors of 30-day readmission after outpatient thyroidectomy: an analysis of the 2011 NSQIP data set.

PURPOSE With enhancements in patient safety and improvements in anesthesia administration, outpatient thyroidectomy is now frequently undertaken as an outpatient procedure, with several peer-reviewed reports of safe implementation totaling over 4500 procedures since 2006. However, robust statistical analyses of predictors for readmission are lacking. METHODS The 2011 NSQIP data set was queried to identify all patients undergoing thyroidectomy on an outpatient basis. Outcomes of interest included surgical and medical complications, reoperation, mortality, and readmission. Univariate and multivariate analyses were utilized to identify the predictors of these events. RESULTS In total 5121 patients were identified to have undergone an outpatient thyroidectomy in 2011. Overall 30-day morbidity was rare with only 47 patients (0.92%) experiencing any perioperative morbidity. One hundred eleven (2.17%) patients were readmitted within 30 days of the operation. A history of COPD was the only preoperative comorbid medical condition that significantly increased a patients risk for readmission (OR 3.73 95% CI 1.57-8.85, p=0.003). Patients with a surgical complication were more than 7 times as likely to be readmitted (OR 2.08-25.28, p=0.002), and those with a medical complication were over 19 times as likely to be readmitted (OR 7.32-50.78, p<0.001). CONCLUSIONS Readmission after outpatient thyroidectomy is infrequent, and compares well with other outpatient procedures. The main identified risks include preoperative COPD and any of the generic postoperative complications tracked in NSQIP. As procedures continue to transition into outpatient settings and financial penalties associated with readmission become a reality, these findings will serve to optimize outpatient surgery utilization.

Anesthesia duration as an independent risk factor for postoperative complications in free flap surgery: a review of 1,305 surgical cases.

Surgical dogma and objective data support the relationship between increased operative times and perioperative complications. However, there has been no large-scale, multi-institutional study that evaluates the impact of increased anesthesia duration on microvascular free tissue transfer. The National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (NSQIP) database was retrospectively reviewed to identify all free-flap patients between 2006 and 2011. Included patients were subdivided into quintiles of anesthesia time. Univariate and multivariate analyses were performed to assess its impact on 30-day postoperative complications. The mean anesthesia duration for all patients was 603 ± 222 minutes. In univariate analysis, 30-day overall/medical complications, reoperation, and free flap loss demonstrated statistically significant increases as anesthesia duration increased (p<0.05). However, in multivariate analyses, these trends and significances were abolished, with exception of the utilization of postoperative transfusions. Of interest, increasing anesthesia duration did not predict flap failure on multivariate analysis. We found that increased anesthesia time correlates with increased postoperative transfusions in free flap patients. As a result, limiting blood loss and avoiding prolonged anesthesia times should be goals for the microvascular surgeon. This is the largest multidisciplinary study to investigate the ongoing debate that longer anesthesia times impart greater risk.

Predictors of readmission after outpatient plastic surgery

Background: Hospital readmissions have become a topic of focus for quality care measures and cost-reduction efforts. However, no comparative multi-institutional data on plastic surgery outpatient readmission rates currently exist. The authors endeavored to investigate hospital readmission rates and predictors of readmission following outpatient plastic surgery. Methods: The 2011 National Surgical Quality Improvement Program database was reviewed for all outpatient procedures. Unplanned readmission rates were calculated for all 10 tracked surgical specialties (i.e., general, thoracic, vascular, cardiac, orthopedics, otolaryngology, plastics, gynecology, urology, and neurosurgery). Multivariate logistic regression models were used to determine predictors of readmission for plastic surgery. Results: A total of 7005 outpatient plastic surgery procedures were isolated. Outpatient plastic surgery had a low associated readmission rate (1.94 percent) compared with other specialties. Seventy-five patients were readmitted with a complication. Multivariate regression analysis revealed obesity (body mass index ≥30), wound infection within 30 days of the index surgery, and American Society of Anesthesiologists class 3 or 4 physical status as significant predictors for unplanned readmission. Conclusions: Unplanned readmission after outpatient plastic surgery is infrequent and compares favorably to rates of readmission among other specialties. Obesity, wound infection within 30 days of the index operation, and American Society of Anesthesiologists class 3 or 4 physical status are independent predictors of readmission. As procedures continue to transition into outpatient settings and the drive to improve patient care persists, these findings will serve to optimize outpatient surgery use. CLINICAL QUESTION/LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Risk, III.

Intraoperative transfusion of packed red blood cells in microvascular free tissue transfer patients: assessment of 30-day morbidity using the NSQIP dataset.

Although often a life-saving therapeutic maneuver, there is minimal data available that details the effects of intraoperative packed red blood cell transfusion (IOT) after microvascular free tissue transfer. The National Surgical Quality Improvement Program database was queried to identify all patients who underwent microvascular free tissue transfer between 2006 and 2010. Multivariate logistic regression models were used to determine the association between intraoperative transfusion and outcomes. Upon bivariate and multivariate analyses, IOT was significantly associated with higher rates of overall complications (odds ratio [OR], 2.02; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.12-3.63), medical complications (OR, 3.35; 95% CI, 1.75-6.42), postoperative transfusion (OR, 6.02; 95% CI, 2.02-17.97), and reoperation (OR, 2.24; 95% CI, 1.24-4.04). IOT was not associated with either surgical complications or free flap loss. IOT significantly increases risk for adverse overall and medical complications. However, IOT was not associated with surgical complications or free flap loss. Transfusion practices in the operating room should be reevaluated to improve overall outcomes.

Anemia is not a predictor of free flap failure: A review of NSQIP data

Thrombosis is a common cause of flap failure in microvascular tissue transfer, which questions the effects of anemia on this outcome. This article seeks to contribute a large, multi‐institutional data analysis to this debate.

Increased anaesthesia duration increases venous thromboembolism risk in plastic surgery: A 6-year analysis of over 19,000 cases using the NSQIP dataset

Abstract Background: Venous thromboembolism (VTE) is a significant cause of morbidity and mortality, particularly in the postoperative setting. Various risk stratification schema exist in the plastic surgery literature, but do not take into account variations in procedure length. The putative risk of VTE conferred by increased length of time under anaesthesia has never been rigorously explored. Aim: The goal of this study is to assess this relationship and to benchmark VTE rates in plastic surgery. Methods: A large, multi-institutional quality-improvement database was queried for plastic and reconstructive surgery procedures performed under general anaesthesia between 2005–2011. In total, 19,276 cases were abstracted from the database. Z-scores were calculated based on procedure-specific mean surgical durations, to assess each case’s length in comparison to the mean for that procedure. A total of 70 patients (0.36%) experienced a post-operative VTE. Patients with and without post-operative VTE were compared with respect to a variety of demographics, comorbidities, and intraoperative characteristics. Potential confounders for VTE were included in a regression model, along with the Z-scores. Results: VTE occurred in both cosmetic and reconstructive procedures. Longer surgery time, relative to procedural means, was associated with increased VTE rates. Further, regression analysis showed increase in Z-score to be an independent risk factor for post-operative VTE (Odds Ratio of 1.772 per unit, p-value < 0.001). Subgroup analyses corroborated these findings. Conclusions: This study validates the long-held view that increased surgical duration confers risk of VTE, as well as benchmarks VTE rates in plastic surgery procedures. While this in itself does not suggest an intervention, surgical time under general anaesthesia would be a useful addition to existing risk models in plastic surgery.

Supratrochlear and supraorbital nerves: an anatomical study and applications in the head and neck area.

Background: This article elucidates the anatomical details of the course and territory of the supraorbital (SO) and supratrochlear (ST) nerves. Possible applications of the SO and ST nerves for sensory nerve transfer are also examined. Methods: The dissection of 3 fresh cadaver heads (6 hemifaces) was performed. In each hemiface, the ST and SO nerves were identified. The following data were recorded: 1) number of branches, 2) skin boundaries, 3) communicative branches, and 4) branch length. The feasibility of specific nerve-transfer procedures was also examined. Results: In 4 hemifaces the SO nerve exited from the SO notch and in 2 hemifaces from the SO foramen. The position was lateral to the midline, with a mean distance of 1.93 cm. In all dissections, a maximum of 4 SO branches (range 2–4) were identified. The ST nerve exited the orbital rim medial to the SO nerve, and lateral to the midline with a mean distance of 0.866 cm. The mean distance between the SO and ST nerves at the level of the SO rim was 1.06 cm. In 5 of 6 hemifaces, several sub-branches emerged from the main trunk of the ST nerve. In 1 hemiface the ST nerve was divided in 2 main branches. Conclusions: The data presented in the current study are in agreement with previous anatomical studies. Both ST and SO nerves can be used as sensory nerve donors in the head and neck area for numerous expanding applications.

Reconstruction of massive oncologic defects using free fillet flaps.

Background: Forequarter and hind-limb amputations are used with curative and palliative intent in the setting of proximal limb, thorax, or truncal malignancies. For these large defects that require a free flap, the distal portions of these limbs can be harvested as fillet flaps and represent the “spare parts” concept of surgical reconstruction. Methods: The authors performed a retrospective review of 27 patients (mean age, 51.4 years) who had undergone immediate reconstruction with free fillet extremity flaps between 1991 and 2008. Seventeen patients received preoperative radiotherapy, and 21 received preoperative chemotherapy. Resections included seven hemipelvectomies, 16 forequarter amputations, and four hindquarter amputations. Results: The mean defect size was 1126 cm2 (range, 480 to 3500 cm2). All 27 flaps survived and all wounds healed. Four patients (15 percent) had complications; three patients developed partial flap necrosis and required operative débridement, and there were two episodes of flap vascular compromise. Mean follow-up time was 14 months. One patient was lost to follow-up. Eight patients (30 percent) were still alive at the end of the study. The remaining 18 patients died within 22 months of resection, for a mean survival of 7 months. There was no cancer recurrence within the flap itself. Phantom pain occurred in 11 patients. At the time of discharge, pain, tissue necrosis, and infection were improved in all patients. Conclusion: The use of the fillet flap is oncologically sound, has no associated donor sites, has an acceptable incidence of major complications, and allows for a healed wound with an improvement in the quality of life.