Diabetes and early postoperative outcomes following lumbar fusion.

STUDY DESIGN: Retrospective cohort study using data from the Nationwide Inpatient Sample administrative data from 1988 through 2003. OBJECTIVE: To examine perioperative morbidity and mortality for patients with and without diabetes mellitus following lumbar spinal fusion. SUMMARY OF BACKGROUND DATA: Diabetes has been associated with worse outcomes in a variety of orthopedic procedures including spinal surgery. There is limited evidence that diabetic patients have more complications following lumbar fusion with little published data to support this conclusion. METHODS: Data from 197,461 patients who underwent lumbar fusion were included. Over 11,000 patients (5.6%) with a postoperative diagnosis of diabetes mellitus were identified. Selected variables were used for comparison of patients with and without diabetes. Bivariate statistical analyses compared postoperative complication rates while multivariate statistics were used to determine likelihood of complications with diabetes. RESULTS: Bivariate analysis demonstrated that diabetes was significantly associated with postoperative infection, need for transfusion, pneumonia, in-hospital mortality, and nonroutine discharge (P

Duke Scholars

Author Chad E. Cook Orthopaedic Surgery, Physical Therapy