No difference between patient mortality rates of experienced and new surgeons

the Oncology Nurse Advisor take:

According to a new study published in the Journal of the American Statistical Association, researchers from the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, have found that there is no statistical difference between the patient mortality rates of experienced and new surgeons.

For the study, researchers analyzed data for 130,106 patients who were operated on in 498 hospitals over a period of 2 years from the Medicare database.

The researchers identified 6,620 surgical patients for each group. Results showed that the mortality rate for patients operated on by experienced surgeons was 3.59% compared with 3.71% for patients operated on by new surgeons.

"It is reassuring that new surgeons were able to achieve similar mortality rates to experienced surgeons when caring for similar patients. However, mortality is a relatively rare event that may not expose the benefits of experience," said Dr. Rachel R. Kelz, associate professor of surgery at the University of Pennsylvania.