No abstract

defined as the proportion of Medicaid or uninsured patient encounters during that time. The highest quartile, representing SNH, was compared to that in lower-burden hospitals. RESULTS: Liver transplant recipients at SNH were more often black and of lower socioeconomic status (p < 0.01), but had similar Model for End-stage Liver Disease (MELD) scores (20 vs 20 vs 18) compared with recipients at medium and low burden hospitals. Lengths of stay (11 days vs 11 vs 10) and readmission rates (36.8% vs 37.1% vs 35.4%) were similar; however, SNH demonstrated higher in-hospital mortality rates (5.2% vs 4.5% vs 2.9%, p < 0.01). Despite these differences, patients who underwent LT at SNH and survived the perioperative setting achieved equivalent overall and graft survival rates at a median follow-up of 2 years (p > 0.05) (Figure). CONCLUSIONS: Despite differences in perioperative outcomes at SNH, these centers achieve equivalent long-term patient and graft survival rates for vulnerable patient populations requiring LT. Strict care standardization, as achieved in LT, may be a mechanism by which outcomes can be improved at SNH after other complex surgical procedures.

Similarly, 80% of patients with rest pain and tissue loss had ABIs ranging from 0.83 to 0 and from 0.94 to 0.16, respectively. As presented in Fig 2, subgroup analyses of patients with and without diabetes did not show a statistically significant difference except in patients with tissue loss. Preoperative ABI and TBI in patients treated with bypass were lower than those in the PVI group.Conclusions: Analysis of a large, multicenter data set of peripheral vascular procedures suggests that while mean ABI and TBI values are different for patients with claudication than for those with rest pain or tissue loss, significant overlap exists between categories. As with ABI and cardiovascular risk, it may be more appropriate to move to report ABIs in PAD to categories of normal, abnormal, and noncompressible.