Ten-year clinical experience of humanitarian cardiothoracic surgery in Rwanda: Building a platform for ultimate sustainability in a resource-limited setting.

Objective: Despite its near complete eradication in resource-rich countries, rheumatic heart disease remains the most common acquired cardiovascular disease in sub-Saharan Africa. With a ratio of physicians/population of 1 per 10,500, including only 4 cardiologists for a population of 11.4 million, Rwanda represents a resource-limited setting lacking the local capacity to detect and treat early cases of strep throat and perform lifesaving operations for advanced rheumatic heart disease.

Preoperative paravertebral blocks for the management of acute pain following mastectomy: a cost-effectiveness analysis.

Purpose: Preoperative paravertebral blocks (PPVBs) are routinely used for treating post-mastectomy pain, yet uncertainties remain about the cost-effectiveness of this modality. We aim to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of PPVBs at common willingness-to-pay (WTP) thresholds.

Methods: A decision analytic model compared two strategies: general anesthesia (GA) alone versus GA with multilevel PPVB.

Endovascular repair of abdominal aortic aneurysms.

Endovascular repair of abdominal aortic aneurysms is an important technique in the vascular surgeon's armamentarium, which has created a seismic shift in the management of aortic pathology over the past two decades. In comparison to traditional open repair, the endovascular approach is associated with significantly improved perioperative morbidity and mortality. The early survival benefit of endovascular abdominal aortic aneurysm repair is sustained up to 3 years postoperatively, but longer-term life expectancy remains poor regardless of operative modality.

The pathophysiology of aortic cross-clamping.

During open aortic surgery, interrupting the blood flow through the aorta by applying a cross-clamp is often a key step to allow for surgical repair. As a consequence, ischemia is induced in parts of the body distal to the clamp site. This significant alteration in the blood flow is almost always associated with hemodynamic changes.

A behaviourally anchored rating scale for evaluating the use of the WHO surgical safety checklist: development and initial evaluation of the WHOBARS.

Background: Realising the full potential of the WHO Surgical Safety Checklist (SSC) to reduce perioperative harm requires the constructive engagement of all operating room (OR) team members during its administration. To facilitate research on SSC implementation, a valid and reliable instrument is needed for measuring OR team behaviours during its administration. We developed a behaviourally anchored rating scale (BARS) for this purpose.