Factors for prolonged length of stay after elective hepatectomy for hepatocellular carcinoma. The surgeon's role in the managed care era.
OBJECTIVE
Length of stay is an important marker of medical resource consumption. In the modern managed care era physicians are driven to deliver the highest quality of care while using fewest resources. Hepatectomy represents a technically challenging and resource-intensive procedure, particularly in the setting of hepatic malignancy and liver cirrhosis. For improving quality of surgical management in such cases, we aimed to identify the factors affecting length of stay after hepatectomy for patients with hepatocellular carcinoma.


METHODS
A total of 375 consecutive surgical hepatocellular carcinoma patients at a tertiary referral center during a 7-year period were reviewed. Length of stay after hepatectomy longer than 14 days was defined as prolonged length of stay. Patients were divided into two groups according to their length of stay. Patients with length of stay less than or equal to 14 days were in Group A and those with length of stay longer than 14 days were in Group B. Data for comparative analysis between both groups were categorized according to preoperative patients' clinical demographic factors, operation-related factors, and pathological factors. The significant univariate factors were used for subsequent multivariate analysis.


RESULTS
The significant independent factors were patients' preoperative prothrombin activity, intraoperative blood transfusion, surgical complication, and the time to abdominal drain removal. Among these independent factors, surgical complication (p < 0.001, relative risk 7.01, and 95% confidence interval 3.46 to 14.18) was the most powerful factor for prolonged length of stay after elective hepatectomy for hepatocellular carcinoma.


CONCLUSIONS
Most of the independent factors for prolonged length of stay after elective hepatectomy for hepatocellular carcinoma patients are operation-related and surgeon-dependent. The surgeon plays a key role in determining length of stay. By minimizing blood transfusion, surgical complication, and the time to abdominal drain removal, length of stay can be significantly decreased in hepatocellular carcinoma patients undergoing hepatectomy.
Hsia
Cheng-Yuan
CY
Department of Surgery, Taipei Veteran General Hospital, National Yang-Ming University School of Medicine, Taiwan. cyhsia@vghtpe.gov.tw
Chau
Gar-Yang
GY
King
Kuang-Liang
KL
Loong
Che-Chuan
CC
Lui
Wing-Yiu
WY
Wu
Chew-Wun
CW
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D006528:Carcinoma, Hepatocellular / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery*; D016001:Confidence Intervals; D005260:Female; D006498:Hepatectomy / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D007902:Length of Stay / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008113:Liver Neoplasms / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery*; D008297:Male; D008329:Managed Care Programs / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008875:Middle Aged; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D010819:Physician's Role; D011183:Postoperative Complications / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology