SURGERY AND ANESTHESIA IN ONTARIO

  • 1 January 1977
    • journal article
    • research article
    • Vol. 116  (11) , 1263-1266
Abstract
Operative and case-fatality rates in Ontario [Canada] for 8 elective (discretionary) and 7 nonelective (nondiscretionary) operations and the proportions of these operations and their anesthetic procedures performed by general practitioners were calculated. Cholecystectomy increased in frequency 32% from 1968 through 1973, tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy decreased 37%, and hysterectomy increased 41% from 1968-1972, then decreased 14%. Except for colectomy the rates for nonelective operations changed only slightly over the 6 yr. Case-fatality rates (hospital deaths/10,000 operations) for the discretionary operations in 1973 were as follows: extraction of lens, 23.1; tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy, 0.4 (2 deaths among 52,938 operations); varicose vein stripping, 6.1; nonrecurrent inguinal herniorrhaphy, 21.9; cholecystectomy, 61.0; hemorrhoidectomy, 9.8; prostatectomy, 115.9; and hysterectomy, 9.6. In 1973 general practitioners did 32% of tonsillectomies and adenoidectomies (61% in 1971), 10-20% of inguinal herniorrhaphies, hemorrhoidectomies and appendectomies and 6% or less of the other operations. They performed 35% or more of the anesthetic procedures for these 4 operations as well as for varicose vein stripping, cholecystectomy and hysterectomy. Rates of general-practice surgery and anesthesia in an urban center in Ontario were substantially less than those for the province as a whole.