Postoperative phase largely to blame for Africa’s high death rate after surgery
Paris — The risk of dying from scheduled surgery in Africa is more than double the global average, researchers said on Wednesday, in a study shedding light on one of the continent’s biggest but most poorly investigated healthcare problems. Patients who go under the knife in Africa in theory have a lower profile for risk than counterparts elsewhere, as they tend to be younger and are likelier to be admitted for minor rather than major surgery, the investigators found. But, they discovered, nearly one in five people who underwent surgery in Africa developed complications. In the case of elective surgery — operations that are scheduled in advance and do not involve a medical emergency — the death rate was 1.0%, compared with 0.5% in the global average. The paper, published in The Lancet medical journal, is described as the deepest and widest probe into surgery across Africa. It brought together more than 30 researchers who trawled through data from 247 hospitals in 25 countries. The ma...
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