Surgery cancellations after entering the operating room

BACKGROUND: Surgery cancellation results in unavailability of the operating room and loss time. We identified the frequency of and reasons for operation cancellations after patients entered the operating room and assessed the preventability of such cancellations. FINDINGS: A retrospective chart review of all scheduled surgical procedures proposed under general anesthesia in a period spanning 2008 to 2016 was performed, and the reasons for cancellation were assessed. A total of 30 surgery procedures were cancelled after the patient had entered the operation room and preparation for general anesthesia had been completed. Ten of 18 cases (55.6%) that were cancelled before general anesthesia induction could have been prevented, accounting for 36.7% of the overall cancellations. The majority of the cancellations after anesthesia were due to the patients’ health status. CONCLUSIONS: Improving the systems for checking patients’ medical problems and performing preoperative evaluations can reduce the number of cancellations after the patient has entered the operating room.