Effectiveness of Preoperative Anaesthesia Assessment in a Multispecialty Hospital in Sub-Saharan Africa

Abstract

Anaesthetists routinely visit patients before surgery for preoperative assessment. As this is often the first contact between the anaesthetist and the patient, the impact of this visit on subsequent patient cooperation may be significant. This study determine the effectiveness of preoperative anaesthetic assessment.

This study was a prospective, descriptive cross-sectional study of 184 American Society of Anaesthesia (ASA) I and II consenting adult patients scheduled for surgical operations at the University of Ilorin Teaching Hospital. A questionnaire was administered to the patients on the day before surgery. The questions assessed the amount of information the patients had about the anaesthetist that conducted the pre-anaesthesia review, the conduct of anaesthesia and the extent of patient participation when determining the anaesthetic plan.

The mean age of the participants was 43.52 ±14.30. When asked to identify the anaesthetist that visited them, 128 (69.57%) patients could not remember the name of the anaesthetist while 138 (75%) did not know the cadre of anaesthetist that visited them.

This study found that pre-anaesthesia assessment was not effectively conducted. The same level of attention and care demonstrated in intraoperative care should be employed during its conduct.

Key words: Anaesthesia assessment, Anaesthesia review, Preoperative assessment