Postoperative complications in adult patients undergoing surgery with confirmed infection by SARS-CoV-2: An integrative review

OBJECTIVE: to analyze the evidence available in the literature about postoperative complications in adult patients undergoing surgical procedures with confirmed infection by SARS-CoV-2. METHOD: an integrative literature review conducted in the CINAHL, EMBASE, LILACS, PubMed, Scopus and Web of Science databases, as well as in the gray literature. The references identified were exported to the EndNote manager and, subsequently, to the Rayyan web application for study selection. The stages of sampling, categorization of studies, evaluation of the studies included, interpretation of the results and knowledge synthesis were performed by two reviewers independently and in a masked manner. The data were analyzed descriptively. RESULTS: of the 247 articles identified, 15 were selected to comprise this review. The prevalent postoperative complications in patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 were the following: cough, dyspnea and hypoxia, need for invasive mechanical ventilation or not, admission to the intensive care unit and death. CONCLUSION: the most reported postoperative complications in the studies evaluated were respiratory-related, followed by cardiovascular complications. The importance of preoperative screening for COVID-19 is highlighted, as well as of the monitoring and tracking of confirmed cases in the postoperative period, as these actions exert an impact on reducing the occurrence of complications related to SARS-CoV-2.