Hospitals that earned American College of Surgeons emergency general surgery verification saw shorter stays, fewer kidney injuries, and lower 30-day mortality after emergency operations.
- Mortality fell 1.63 percentage points, a 28.8% relative reduction, versus control hospitals.
- Length of stay dropped 1.31 days, and acute kidney injury fell 1.23 percentage points.
- Verified hospitals admitted more patients to surgical services (85.7% vs 74.8%) and operated sooner, by 10.7 hours.
Verification is a reasonable target for hospitals managing emergency general surgery, but this quasi-experimental study cannot prove that verification itself caused the gains. Its five verified hospitals treated sicker patients at baseline, so the results apply to comparable emergency surgery programs rather than to all hospitals.
Journal Article by Hobika GG, Wandling MW (…) Ko CY et 10 al. in JAMA Surg