12-hour call shifts improve patient outcomes, lower costs

Editor's Note

An acute-care surgery model that caps surgeon call shifts at 12 hours instead of 24 hours for covering surgical emergencies has led to shorter hospital stays, lower infection rates, and lower overall costs for patients with acute appendicitis, finds this study presented October 30 at the American College of Surgeons Clinical Congress 2019 in San Francisco.

Compared with the traditional model, patients treated by surgeons practicing under the acute-care surgery model:

• had an average length of stay of 0.73 days vs 2 days
• had no reported cases of organ space infection vs a rate of 7.1%
• were seen by a surgeon more than an hour sooner after they arrived at the hospital (2 hours, 9 minutes vs 3 hours, 14 minutes)
• had lower per-patient costs ($1,452 vs $9,834).

In addition to better patient outcomes and lower costs, the model is improving morale for the acute-care surgeons and for the general surgeons who no longer have to take general surgery call, the authors say.