DETERMINANTS OF PROLONGED HOSPITALIZATION FOLLOWING EMERGENCY LAPAROTOMY IN THE BUEA AND LIMBE REGIONAL HOSPITALS: A FIVE - YEAR RETROSPECTIVE STUDY divymoks2001@yahoo.com

PW07-20

DETERMINANTS OF PROLONGED HOSPITALIZATION FOLLOWING EMERGENCY LAPAROTOMY IN THE BUEA AND LIMBE REGIONAL HOSPITALS: A FIVE - YEAR RETROSPECTIVE STUDY

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Cameroon

Oral or Poster

Prolonged hospital stay poses a significant burden on individuals and family members as well as on health systems especially in low and middle income countries, and in turn denies other patients the access to similar hospital services and resources. Ample preoperative preparation is usually achieved in elective surgery which may not always be the case in emergency situations hence our objective was to identify the determinants of prolonged hospitalization following emergency laparotomy in Buea and Limbe Regional Hospitals of Cameroon.

This was a five-year retrospective review of hospital records from January 2019 to December 2023. We included all records of patients who underwent emergency laparotomy and their various postoperative hospitalization lengths.Continuous variables were summarized into interquartile ranges and medians. The length of hospitalization was categorized into standard (1-7 days) and prolonged (more than 7 days). Data was analyzed using SPSS version 25

Out of 4782 records reviewed, 334(100%) emergency laparotomy files were retailed. The indications for emergency laparotomy included peritonitis, acute appendicitis, intussusception, intestinal obstructions. The median postoperative length of stay following emergency abdominal surgery was 7 days. The proportion of patients with prolonged stay was 45%. Age > 50 (p<0.05),comorbidities (p<0.05), colon surgery (p<0.001), delayed ambulation > 2 days (p<0.001), fasting > 2 days (p<0.001), as well as development of complications (p<0.001), were found to be associated with prolonged length of stay.

Almost half of the patients had a prolonged postoperative hospital stay with age, presence of comorbidities,colon surgery, lengthy surgery, development of postoperative complications being contributing factors.