A new study found that a method of reducing unneeded pre-op testing was effective.
Three hospitals were analyzed in the study. They started out with “unneeded testing being done in 68% of healthy patients having three types of elective surgery: to remove their gallbladder, fix a hernia, or remove a breast lump.” By the end of the six-month trial, only “about 40% of such patients had the test.”
The program behind the research, called the Michigan Program on Value Enhancement, or MPrOVE, had prior published results from the initial phase of a study. This new paper focuses on “eleven tests and document[s] the impact of a multi-step effort to reduce testing by creating a tailored program for each hospital.”
The tests selected for reduction in healthy patients were “electrocardiography, transthoracic echocardiography, cardiac stress tests, chest X-rays, urinalysis, complete blood cell count, basic metabolic panel, comprehensive metabolic panel, coagulation studies, and pulmonary function tests, including blood gas analysis and spirometry.” The team evaluated use of those tests in elective surgery patients and coached the pre-operative and surgical teams on the results.
The team has expanded their initiative to “16 more Michigan hospitals over the course of 2025 and 2026.”
