Is compliance with surgical care improvement project cardiac (SCIP-Card-2) measures for perioperative β-blockers associated with reduced incidence of mortality and cardiovascular-related critical quality indicators after noncardiac surgery?
BACKGROUND: While continuation of β-blockers (BBs) perioperatively has become a national quality improvement measure, the relationship between BB withdrawal and mortality and cardiovascular-related critical quality indicators has not been studied in a contemporary cohort of patients undergoing noncardiac surgery. METHODS: For this retrospective study, the quality assurance database of a large community-based anesthesiology group practice was used to identify 410,288 surgical cases, 18 years of age or older, who underwent elective or emergent noncardiac surgical procedures between January 1, 2009, and December 31, 2014. Each surgical case that was withdrawn from BBs perioperatively was propensity matched by clinical and surgical characteristics to 4 cases that continued BBs perioperatively. Subsequently, multivariable conditional logistic regression analyses were performed in the matched cohort to determine the extent to which withdrawal of perioperative BBs was independently associated with mortality as the primary outcome and cardiovascular-related critical quality indicators as the secondary outcome (need for vasopressor, electrocardiographic changes requiring treatment, unplanned admission to intensive care unit, postanesthesia care unit stay >2 hours, and a combination of cardiac arrest and myocardial infarction) within 48 hours postoperatively. RESULTS: Of the 66,755 (16%) cases in the cohort admitted on BB therapy, BBs were withdrawn in 3829 (6%) and continued in 62,926 (94%). Propensity score matching resulted in an analysis cohort of 19,145 cases. Withdrawal of perioperative BBs in the multivariable conditional logistic regression analysis was significantly associated with an increased risk for mortality (odds ratio [OR], 3.61; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.75–7.35; P = .0003), but a significantly decreased risk for need of blood pressure support requiring vasopressor initiation (OR, 0.84; 95% CI, 0.76–0.92; P = .0003) and extended postanesthesia care unit stay (OR, 0.69; 95% CI, 0.54–0.88; P = .004) within 48 hours after noncardiac surgery. CONCLUSIONS: Perioperative withdrawal of BBs was associated with increased risk for mortality within 48 hours after noncardiac surgery and with decreased risk for need of vasopressor during the early postoperative period and a shorter stay in the postanesthesia care unit. Copyright © 2017 International Anesthesia Research Society.