Rationale for Anesthesia Groups to Run Additional Flexible Operating Rooms for Multiple Surgeons Who Have Scheduled More than 8 Hours of Cases

US National Anesthesia Workload on Saturday and Sunday Mornings

BACKGROUND

In order to provide guidance to organizations considering elective weekend surgical case scheduling, we analyzed data from the American Society of Anesthesiologist's Anesthesia Quality Institute. We determined the US anesthesia workload on Saturdays and Sundays.

METHODS

The American Society of Anesthesiologist's Anesthesia Quality Institute data were from all US anesthesia groups that submitted cases to the National Anesthesia Clinical Outcomes Registry for 2013. For each of the N = 2,075,188 cases, we identified the local date and time of the start of anesthesia care and the duration of anesthesia care. Anesthesia workload was measured as the time from the start to the end of continuous anesthesia care. Because elective cases are rarely scheduled on Sundays, we considered the difference in workload between Saturday and Sunday to estimate elective case scheduling. This difference would be an overestimate if some patients' scheduled cases were postponed from Friday to Saturday. Data are reported as mean ± standard error; N = 13 four-week periods.

RESULTS

The difference in the anesthesia minutes between Saturdays versus Sundays 7:00 AM to 2:59 PM (ie, elective caseload) represented just 0.38% ± 0.02% of the total minutes nationwide; Saturday 1.57% ± 0.03% versus Sunday 1.19% ± 0.02%. The P < .00001 comparing the 0.38% with 1.0% and, also, with 0.5% (upper 99% confidence interval = 0.42%).

CONCLUSIONS

The imputed Saturday elective schedule represents a tiny percentage of overall anesthetic workload nationwide. Saturday elective surgery is currently an uncommon practice in the United States. Based on this prior knowledge, organizations considering changes to their current scheduling strategies should perform a thorough statistical analysis of their local workload prior to implementation and apply evidence-based criteria to guide their decision-making process.

Anesthesia Workload Nationally During Regular Workdays and Weekends

BACKGROUND

We analyze data from the American Society of Anesthesiologist's (ASA) Anesthesia Quality Institute (AQI) to report the U.S. anesthesia workload by time of day and day of the week. We consider the extent to which first case starts, rather than durations of workdays and weekend cases, influence the number of anesthesia providers nationally.

METHODS

The ASA AQI data were from all the U.S. anesthesia groups that submitted cases to the National Anesthesia Clinical Outcomes Registry (NACOR) for all 12 months of 2013. For each of the n = 2,075,188 cases, we identified the local date and time of the start of anesthesia care, duration of anesthesia care, and the local time zone. Anesthesia workload was measured as the time from the start to the end of continuous anesthesia care. Data are reported as mean ± SEM with 95% confidence intervals (CIs).

RESULTS

Half (53.0% ± 0.6%) of the ASA AQI-reported weekly anesthesia workload was completed by 1:00 PM, local time, on regular workdays. The busiest 8-hour interval was from 7:30 AM to 3:30 PM and accounted for 70.3% ± 0.7% of anesthetic minutes. Although most facilities completed the majority of their weekly anesthesia workload in the mornings of regular workdays (P < 0.0001; 62.3%; CI, 58.6%-66.1%), just 24.4% of the University and large community hospitals did so (P = 0.0008 relative to half; CI, 13.8%-38.4%).

CONCLUSIONS

The results are inconsistent with widespread use of surgical facilities (i.e., anesthesia providers) in mornings only, especially at University and large community hospitals. The observed national work hours match with what would be expected if most anesthesiologists work at least 8 hours on regular workdays. Opportunity for greater use of the capital (building and equipment) probably would involve the use of additional anesthesia providers representing a second shift or use of weekends.