Total Knee Arthroplasty in Freestanding Ambulatory Surgery Centers: 5-Year Retrospective Chart Review of 90-Day Postsurgical Outcomes and Health Care Resource Utilization.

INTRODUCTION: Migration of total knee arthroplasty (TKA) procedures from the inpatient setting to outpatient venues, especially freestanding ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs), requires the use of reliable patient selection algorithms and standardized perioperative pathways to facilitate favorable outcomes for patients. METHODS: This retrospective chart review included consecutive TKA procedures performed over a 5-year period between January 2014 and January 2019 at 2 freestanding ASCs. The patient selection algorithm was developed on the basis of patient comorbidities to minimize the potential for adverse events. All procedures were performed by one of eight orthopedic surgeons who were identified a priori as adhering to similar multimodal pain management regimens, including the use of spinal anesthesia, general or monitored-care anesthesia, adductor canal blocks, pericapsular injection of liposomal bupivacaine, nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, gabapentin, tramadol, acetaminophen, and oxycodone on an as-needed basis. Outcomes, including surgical complications, healthcare resource utilization (HCRU), and patient satisfaction, were measured before discharge and at a 90-day follow-up visit. RESULTS: Four hundred thirty-nine TKA procedures in 386 patients were identified for inclusion. Of these patients, 115 (29.8%) were performed in patients with the American Society of Anesthesiologists physical status IIIa. Mean (standard deviation) length of stay at the ASC was 500 (107) minutes, including 136 (47) minutes of surgery and 201 (78) minutes to ambulation. The overall rates of surgical complications and 90-day hospital admissions were low (1.4% and 0.7%, respectively), as was the need for additional HCRU, including additional surgical procedures related to index surgery, emergency department visits, and unplanned clinic visits or calls. At the 90-day follow-up visit, 96% of patients reported being pleased with their outcomes. DISCUSSION: With careful patient selection, standardized perioperative pathways, and multimodal analgesia protocols, TKA procedures can be performed in the ASC setting with low complication rates, minimal postdischarge HCRU, and high rates of patient satisfaction. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: III.

The contribution of stress to the social patterning of clinical and subclinical CVD risk factors in African Americans: the Jackson Heart Study.

It is often hypothesized that psychosocial stress may contribute to associations of socioeconomic position (SEP) with risk factors for cardiovascular disease (CVD). However, few studies have investigated this hypothesis among African Americans, who may be more frequently exposed to stressors due to social and economic circumstances. Cross-sectional data from the Jackson Heart Study (JHS), a large population-based cohort of African Americans, were used to examine the contributions of stressors to the association of SEP with selected cardiovascular (CVD) risk factors and subclinical atherosclerotic disease. Among women, higher income was associated with lower prevalence of hypertension, obesity, diabetes and carotid plaque and lower levels of stress. Higher stress levels were also weakly, albeit positively, associated with hypertension, diabetes, and obesity, but not with plaque. Adjustment for the stress measures reduced the associations of income with hypertension, diabetes and obesity by a small amount that was comparable to, or larger, than the reduction observed after adjustment for behavioral risk factors. In men, high income was associated with lower prevalence of diabetes and stressors were not consistently associated with any of the outcomes examined. Overall, modest mediation effects of stressors were observed for diabetes (15.9%), hypertension (9.7%), and obesity (5.1%) among women but only results for diabetes were statistically significant. No mediation effects of stressors were observed in men. Our results suggest that stressors may partially contribute to associations of SEP with diabetes and possibly hypertension and obesity in African American women. Further research with appropriate study designs and data is needed to understand the dynamic and interacting effects of stressors and behaviors on CVD outcomes as well as sex differences in these effects.

The socioeconomic gradient of diabetes prevalence, awareness, treatment, and control among African Americans in the Jackson Heart Study.

PURPOSE: Little research has focused on the social patterning of diabetes among African Americans. We examined the relationship between socioeconomic status (SES) and the prevalence, awareness, treatment, and control of diabetes among African Americans. METHODS: Education, income and occupation were examined among 4,303 participants (2,726 women and 1,577 men). Poisson regression estimated relative probabilities (RP) of diabetes outcomes by SES. RESULTS: The prevalence of diabetes was 19.6% in women and 15.9% in men. Diabetes awareness, treatment, and control were 90.0%, 86.8%, and 39.2% in women, respectively, and 88.2%, 84.4%, and 35.9% in men, respectively. In adjusted models, low-income men and women had greater probabilities of diabetes than high-income men and women (RP, 1.94; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.28-2.92; and RP, 1.35; 95% CI, 1.04-1.74, respectively). Lack of awareness was associated with low education and low occupation in women (RP, 2.28; 95%CI 1.01-5.18; and RP, 2.62; 95% CI, 1.08-6.33, respectively) but not in men. Lack of treatment was associated with low education in women. Diabetes control was not patterned by SES. CONCLUSIONS: Diabetes prevalence is patterned by SES, and awareness and treatment are patterned by SES in women but not men. Efforts to prevent diabetes in African Americans need to address the factors that place those of low SES at higher risk.

Racial/ethnic heterogeneity in the socioeconomic patterning of CVD risk factors: in the United States: the multi-ethnic study of atherosclerosis.

Many studies document racial variation, gender differences, and socioeconomic status (SES) patterning in cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factors but few studies have investigated heterogeneity in SES differences by race/ethnicity or gender. Using data from the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (N=6,814) and stratified regression models, we investigated race/ethnic differences in the SES patterning of diabetes, hypertension, smoking, and body mass index (BMI). Inverse socioeconomic gradients in hypertension, diabetes, smoking, and BMI were observed in White and Black women but associations were weaker or absent in Hispanic and Chinese women (except in the case of diabetes for Hispanic women). Even greater heterogeneity in social patterning of risk factors was observed in men. In White men all four risk factors were inversely associated with socioeconomic position, although often associations were only present or were stronger for education than for income. The inverse socioeconomic patterning was much less consistent in men of other races/ethnic groups, and higher SES was associated with higher BMI in non-White men. These findings have implications for understanding the causes of social patterning, for the analysis of SES adjusted race/ethnic differences, and for the targeting of interventions.