Perioperative risk assessment. The Project Perioperative Risk (PROPER).

Surgical operations are preceded by an assessment of the anticipated risks for the patient due to the operation. The present assessment procedure is not optimally organised and the scientific base is weak. In this project a new organisation was tested that provides more relevant data on the risk and more optimal timing if the risk has to be modified. All elective patients from a defined geographical area (n = 1361) were seen one week before the operation for risk assessment. They were then followed up during and after the operation. About 30% of the operations were followed by complications. More than half of them were mild. Severe complications were rare. Three risk assessment classifications were tested. They were all fairly good estimators of the risk but had different properties. The next step in this project is to systematically evaluate the main risk-affecting factors to improve the quality of risk assessment.