Risk factors of early postoperative bowel obstruction for patients undergoing selective colorectal surgeries

OBJECTIVE: Postoperative bowel obstruction was one of the most severe complications in patients who received colorectal surgeries. This study aimed to explore risk factors of early postoperative obstruction and to construct a nomogram to predict the possibility of occurrence. METHODS: The records of 1437 patients who underwent elective colorectal surgery in Peking University People’s Hospital from 2015 to 2020 were retrospectively collected. Risk factors of early postoperative bowel obstruction were identified by logistic regression analysis and a nomogram was then constructed. Bootstrap was applied to verify the stability of the model. RESULTS: COPD, hypothyroidism, probiotic indications, duration of antibiotics, and time to postoperative feeding were identified as independent risk factors and were put into a nomogram for predicting early postoperative bowel obstruction. The nomogram showed robust discrimination, with the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve was 0.894 and was well-calibrated. CONCLUSION: A nomogram including independent risk factors of COPD, hypothyroidism, probiotic indications, duration of antibiotics, and time to postoperative feeding were established to predict the risk of early postoperative bowel obstruction.