Impact of Procedure Volumes and Focused Practice on Short-Term Outcomes of Elective and Urgent Colon Cancer Resection in Italy

BACKGROUND: The relationship between hospital volumes and short-term patients' outcomes of colon cancer (CC) surgery is not well established in the literature. Moreover, evidence about short-term outcomes of urgent compared with elective CC procedures is scanty. The aims of this study are 1) to determine whether caseloads and other hospital characteristics are associated with short-term outcomes of CC surgery; 2) to compare the outcomes of urgent and elective CC surgery. METHODS: A total of 14,200 patients undergoing CC surgery between 2005 and 2010 in the General Surgery Units (GSUs) of the hospitals of Emilia-Romagna region, Northern Italy, were identified from the hospital discharge records database. The outcomes of interest were 30-day in-hospital mortality, re-intervention and 30-day re-admission. Using multilevel analysis, we analyzed the relationship of GSU volumes and focused practice, defined as the percentage of CC operations over total operations, with the three outcomes. RESULTS: High procedure volumes were associated with a lower risk of 30-day in-hospital mortality, after adjusting for patients' characteristics [aOR (95% CI) = 0.51 (0.33-0.81)]. Stratified analyses for elective and urgent surgery showed that high volumes were associated with a lower 30-day mortality for elective patients [aOR (95% CI) = 0.35 (0.17-0.71)], but not for urgent patients [aOR (95% CI) = 0.72 (0.42-1.24)]. Focused practice was an independent predictor of re-intervention [aOR (95% CI) = 0.67 (0.47-0.97)] and re-admission [aRR (95% CI) = 0.88 (0.78-0.98)]. CONCLUSIONS: The present study adds evidence in support of the notion that patients with CC undergoing surgery at high-volume and focused surgical units experience better short-term outcomes.