What is known?
In population-level studies from the USA and Europe, pancreatic resection in high-volume centres has been reported to be associated with significant improvements in surgical outcomes including post-operative mortality, quality of surgical resection and survival when compared with outcomes in low-volume centres.
What is new?
Two-year survival and quality of surgery was better for patients undergoing pancreaticoduodenectomy in hospitals performing six or more procedures annually.
What does this mean?
The positive association between these outcomes and higher hospital resection-volumes reported in Europe and the USA, may also apply to regions characterised by smaller populations and lower overall hospital resection-volumes.
Contact: Peter Baade
Reference: Narendra A, Baade PD, Aitken JF, Fawcett J, Smithers BM. Pancreaticoduodenectomy in a low-resection volume region: a population-level study examining the impact of hospital-volume on surgical quality and longer-term survival. HPB (Oxford). 2020; 22(9):1288-1294.