Summary
We investigated age- and sex-specific incidence, risk factors, and latency period
of a perioperative acute thromboembolism syndrome (PATS) in a large cohort study.
We prospectively analyzed data on 21903 consecutive surgery patients to determine
the incidence of myocardial infarction, pulmonary embolism, deep venous thrombosis,
stroke, and cardiovascular death within 30 postoperative days. Among 255 (1.2 percent)
patients with thromboembolism, 105 (0.48 percent) suffered myocardial infarction (mean
latency: 5 days), 30 (0.14 percent) suffered pulmonary embolism (6 days), 23 (0.11
percent) suffered deep venous thrombosis (10 days), 97 (0.44 percent) suffered stroke
(11 days), and 13 (0.06 percent) died (12 days). The critical period was postoperative
week 1 for myocardial infarction and pulmonary embolism, and postoperative week 1
and 2 for deep venous thrombosis, stroke, and death. Risk of all events increased
with age (P<0.0001), particularly for over 70 years (odds ratio: 12.5; 95 percent
confidence interval, 7.8 to 19.9). Males had an increased risk (P<0.0001) of myocardial
infarction (odds ratio; 1.5; 95 percent confidence interval, 1.0 to 2.3). Females
had an increased risk (P<0.0001) of pulmonary embolism (odds ratio: 2.7; 95 percent
confidence interval, 1.3 to 5.9) and deep venous thrombosis (odds ratio: 9.8; 95 percent
confidence interval, 3.3 to 29.3). Risk of thromboembolic event was higher (P<0.0001)
in patients with a history of arterial thrombotic events or cancer. Trend analysis
indicates that thromboembolic events will increase 3-fold over the next decade. Our
findings enable identification of higher risk patients for prophylactic anti-thromboembolic
treatment and awareness of the critical postoperative period.
Keywords
Myocardial infarction - pulmonary embolism - deep venous thrombosis - stroke - death