Impact of safety protocol in an ambulatory surgical setting vs a hospital setting for laparoscopic-assisted myomectomy (LAM)

Ambulatory surgery center (ASC) for major gynecological surgery improves efficiency and decreases cost compared to a hospital setting. Protocols to ensure safety when performing major gynecologic surgeries are critical in the ASC setting. The objective of this study is to assess whether protocols do ensure safety when performing major gynecological surgeries such as laparoscopic-assisted myomectomy (LAM) in a high-volume ASC and compare it with protocols and outcomes in a hospital setting. This is a descriptive / retrospective study. This paper descriptively outlines the similarities and differences of a surgical safety protocol in an ambulatory surgical center compared to a hospital setting. Furthermore there is retrospective analysis of LAM outcomes that are commonly considered as safety standards in both settings including intraoperative and postoperative complications. The protocols were similar with regards to preoperative patient selection and checklist, surgical precautions including prevention of retained surgical items, DVT prophylaxis, infection control, surgical wound classification, vaginal and genital antisepsis for the surgical patient, postoperative care in PACU and discharge criteria for surgical management. The major preoperative differences from hospital protocol were transfusion criteria preoperatively. In the ASC, a cut-off of 9.0 g/dl was used, and a cut-off of < 7.5 g/dl was used in the hospital setting. LAM cases are only scheduled as morning cases. 23 hour observation is available at ASC. Additionally myomectomy patients at the ASC have ISTAT (blood analysis system to check Hemoglobin/Hematocrit) prior to procedure and at 1 and 2 hours after the procedure in the PACU to detect any signs of bleeding. Any patients that did require blood transfusion postoperatively were transferred to the local hospital from the ASC. There were 588 patients that underwent LAM at the ASC compared to 228 patients at the hospital. There was no significant difference in case complexity factors between settings including BMI, number of previous abdominal and pelvic surgeries or other comorbidities. Intraoperative complication rate was 3.4% (95% CI 1.8-5.0) at the ASC compared to 4.9% (95% CI 1.7-8.1) , p = 0.4430. There were no significant differences in postoperative complications between the ASC and the hospital setting including infections and thromboembolic events. Blood transfusion was required in 1.7% of the cases at ASC compared to 8.8% at the hospital setting. The estimated blood loss and average fibroid weight were not statistically different between the two groups. The LAM safety protocol at a free-standing ASC allows for patient complication outcomes that are comparable to an in-hospital setting without apparent limitations in patient complexity.