Pediatric Day Case Surgical Practice at a Tertiary Hospital in Lagos: How Have We Faired?

BACKGROUND: There has been a gradual increase in the number of patients treated as a day case surgery in our center. This study has been conducted to audit pediatric day case surgery practice at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital. AIMS: The aim of the following study is to determine the morbidity and mortality from day case surgery in our center. SUBJECTS AND METHODS: The type of study was a prospective study over a 2½ year period at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital. The patients scheduled for surgeries were assessed in the pediatric outpatient clinic and information obtained for each of the patients included age, sex, diagnosis and operation planned. Additional information collected included the (1) type of anesthesia (2) post-operative complications and the cadre of the surgeon. The data was analyzed using SPSS version 19 (IBM Corp. Released 2010. IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, Version 19.0. Armonk, NY: IBM Corp, USA). RESULT: A total of 381 patients were operated during the study period. The age range of patients was 2 weeks to 15 years and the mean age was 2.9 years (3.0). There were 338 male patients (88.7%;338/381) and 43 females (11.3%;43/381). Inguinal hernias and hydroceles constituted almost half of the cases treated while 16.0% of cases were undescended testis. There were four morbidities and no mortality. CONCLUSION: Day case surgery is associated with a low morbidity and no mortality in our center.