Background

Bariatric surgery is one of the safest types of general surgery performed in the United States, largely due to the extensive screening process that patients undergo prior to surgery. This screening process, however, is lengthy and can be a roadblock for patients seeking the procedure. To address this limitation, we changed the preoperative screening process at our single academic center in 2022 from mandatory cardiac and pulmonary clearances to selective clearance requirements based on STOP-BANG and MET screening tools. This study presents our experience in adapting a scoring-system-based preoperative process for bariatric surgery patients.

Methods

We conducted a retrospective analysis of bariatric surgery patients at a single center from 2017 to 2023 with the hypothesis that risk-based screening in the preoperative process would safely reduce the time from consultation to surgery.

Results

Our adaptation of a scoring system-based approach produced a significant impact on the preoperative process length with the average time to surgery decreasing by over 100 days (P <0.02). There was no statistically significant change in morbidity, mortality, the rate of readmission, or the rate of reoperations with the new preoperative protocol.

Conclusions

This study highlights the successful integration of a scoring-system-based preoperative process in bariatric surgery patients at a single academic center. Our findings suggest that such an approach decreases time to surgery without compromising patient safety. Further research and prospective studies are warranted to assess the generalizability of these findings in diverse clinical settings.