Pooled analysis of who surgical safety checklist use and mortality after emergency laparotomy

Background: The World Health Organization (WHO) Surgical Safety Checklist has fostered safe practice for 10 years, yet its place in emergency surgery has not been assessed on a global scale. The aim of this study was to evaluate reported checklist use in emergency settings and examine the relationship with perioperative mortality in patients who had emergency laparotomy. Methods: In two multinational cohort studies, adults undergoing emergency laparotomy were compared with those having elective gastrointestinal surgery. Relationships between reported checklist use and mortality were determined using multivariable logistic regression and bootstrapped simulation. Results: Of 12 296 patients included from 76 countries, 4843 underwent emergency laparotomy. After adjusting for patient and disease factors, checklist use before emergency laparotomy was more common in countries with a high Human Development Index (HDI) (2455 of 2741, 89⋅6 per cent) compared with that in countries with a middle (753 of 1242, 60⋅6 per cent; odds ratio (OR) 0⋅17, 95 per cent c.i. 0⋅14 to 0⋅21, P < 0⋅001) or low (363 of 860, 42⋅2 percent; OR 0⋅08, 0⋅07 to 0⋅10, P < 0⋅001) HDI. Checklist use was less common in elective surgery than for emergency laparotomy in high-HDI countries (risk difference −9⋅4 (95 per cent c.i. −11⋅9 to −6⋅9) per cent; P < 0⋅001), but the relationship was reversed in low-HDI countries (+12⋅1 (+7⋅0 to +17⋅3) per cent; P < 0⋅001). In multivariable models, checklist use was associated with a lower 30-day perioperative mortality (OR 0⋅60, 0⋅50 to 0⋅73; P < 0⋅001). The greatest absolute benefit was seen for emergency surgery in low-and middle-HDI countries. Conclusion: Checklist use in emergency laparotomy was associated with a significantly lower perioperative mortality rate. Checklist use in low-HDI countries was half that in high-HDI countries

Consensus statement: Standardized reporting of power-producing luminescent solar concentrator performance

Fair and meaningful device performance comparison among luminescent solar concentrator-photovoltaic (LSC-PV) reports cannot be realized without a general consensus on reporting standards in LSC-PV research. Therefore, it is imperative to adopt standardized characterization protocols for these emerging types of PV devices that are consistent with other PV devices. This commentary highlights several common limitations in LSC literature and summarizes the best practices moving forward to harmonize with standard PV reporting, considering the greater nuances present with LSC-PV. Based on these practices, a checklist of actionable items is provided to help standardize the characterization/reporting protocols and offer a set of baseline expectations for authors, reviewers, and editors. The general consensus combined with the checklist will ultimately guide LSC-PV research towards reliable and meaningful advances

In Vivo Imaging in Mice

International audienc

Development and external validation of the 'Global Surgical-Site Infection' (GloSSI) predictive model in adult patients undergoing gastrointestinal surgery

Background Identification of patients at high risk of surgical-site infections may allow surgeons to minimize associated morbidity. However, there are significant concerns regarding the methodological quality and transportability of models previously developed. The aim of this study was to develop a novel score to predict 30-day surgical-site infection risk after gastrointestinal surgery across a global context and externally validate against existing models. Methods This was a secondary analysis of two prospective international cohort studies: GlobalSurg-1 (July–November 2014) and GlobalSurg-2 (January–July 2016). Consecutive adults undergoing gastrointestinal surgery were eligible. Model development was performed using GlobalSurg-2 data, with novel and previous scores externally validated using GlobalSurg-1 data. The primary outcome was 30-day surgical-site infections, with two predictive techniques explored: penalized regression (least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (‘LASSO’)) and machine learning (extreme gradient boosting (‘XGBoost’)). Final model selection was based on prognostic accuracy and clinical utility. Results There were 14 019 patients (surgical-site infections = 12.3%) for derivation and 8464 patients (surgical-site infections = 11.4%) for external validation. The LASSO model was selected due to similar discrimination to extreme gradient boosting (AUC 0.738 (95% c.i. 0.725 to 0.750) versus 0.737 (95% c.i. 0.709 to 0.765)), but greater explainability. The final score included six variables: country income, ASA grade, diabetes, and operative contamination, approach, and duration. Model performance remained good on external validation (AUC 0.730 (95% c.i. 0.715 to 0.744); calibration intercept −0.098 and slope 1.008) and demonstrated superior performance to the external validation of all previous models. Conclusion The ‘Global Surgical-Site Infection’ score allows accurate prediction of the risk of surgical-site infections with six simple variables that are routinely available at the time of surgery across global settings. This can inform the use of intraoperative and postoperative interventions to modify the risk of surgical-site infections and minimize associated harm