E. P. Ng1, F. O. Velez-Cubian1,2, M. Echavarria1, C. Moodie2, J. Garrett2, J. Fontaine2, L. Robinson2, E. Toloza1,2 1University Of South Florida College Of Medicine,Tampa, FL, USA 2Moffitt Cancer Center And Research Institute,Tampa, FL, USA
Introduction:
In this study, we sought to investigate the effect of post-operative atrial fibrillation incidence after robotic-assisted video-thoracoscopic pulmonary lobectomy on comorbid postoperative complications, chest tube duration, and hospital length of stay.
Methods:
We retrospectively analyzed prospectively collected data from 208 consecutive patients who underwent robotic-assisted pulmonary lobectomy by one surgeon for known or suspected lung cancer. Postoperatively, 39 (18.75%) of these patients experienced atrial fibrillation (AF) during their hospital stay. The presentations of postoperative complications other than AF, chest tube duration, and hospital length of stay were analyzed in patients with AF and without AF postoperatively. Statistical significance (p<0.05) was determined by unpaired student’s t-test.
Results:
Of patients with postoperative AF, 46% also had other concurrent postop complications, while only 31% of patients without AF experienced complications. The average number of postoperative complications experienced by patients with AF was significantly higher than that experienced by those without AF (0.92 vs. 0.44, p = 0.001). The mean (9.8 days) and median (8 days) hospital lengths of stay in the AF patients were significantly longer than those without AF, whose mean and median hospital stays were 6.1 days and 4 days, respectively. A similar result was also seen with chest tube duration, with the mean and median chest tube duration in AF patients (9.6 days and 6 days, respectively) were significantly higher than those in patients without AF (5.6 days and 4 days, respectively). Results were summerized in Table 1 with standard deviation (SD) and standard error of the mean (SEM).
Conclusion:
This study demonstrated the association between the incidence of atrial fibrillation and a more complicated hospital course. Further studies were needed to evaluation whether confounders were involved in these associations.
