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Introduction: Although there are many patient-reported outcome measures used for ventral hernia (VH), disease-specific instruments, such as the Hernia-related Quality-of-Life (QoL) Survey (HerQLes) and Abdominal Hernia-Q (AHQ), have shown greater accuracy in capturing all VH-related QoL. We present a novel calibration that allows providers to convert scores between the AHQ and HerQLes, enabling better unification of QoL data., Methods: Patients with VH were prospectively identified and simultaneously administered both the AHQ and HerQLes pre- and post-operatively. To ensure the validity of the calibration, responses were excluded if patients answered instruments on different dates or if the responses were discordant on corresponding questions within each instrument. The calibration was estimated using a linear mixed effects model, including linear and quadratic scores, timing of survey relative to surgery and their interactions as fixed effects, and patients as random effects to account for multiple surveys from the same patient., Results: In total, 109 patients were included, responding to 300 pairs of surveys (112 preoperative and 188 postoperative), of which 17 (5.6%) were excluded because of discordant responses. Conversion of the HerQLes to AHQ was most accurate when including whether the survey was completed pre- or post-operatively, with a mean squared error of 0.0091. Similarly, converting the AHQ to HerQLes was most accurate when factoring in the timing of survey administration, with a mean squared error of 0.016., Conclusions: We present a novel and accurate method to convert scores between the AHQ and HerQLes. Being able to unify QoL data from different PROMs supports efforts to more broadly integrate PROMs in surgery and to understand patient-defined measures of success., (Copyright © 2022 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: Obese individuals are thought to be higher risk for complications after excisional abdominal body contouring (EAC) due to co-morbidities and significant tissue resection., Objectives: We comparatively analyzed EAC patients with Body Mass Index (BMI) ≥35 kg/m 2 and BMI <35 kg/m 2 to highlight key differences in clinical and patient-reported-outcomes (PROs)., Methods: Patients ≥18 years-old undergoing EAC by a single surgeon from 01/2018-01/2020 were identified and separated into cohorts based on BMI (<35 and ≥35 kg/m 2 ). Patients were excluded if they had a cosmetic abdominoplasty without history of bariatric surgery or massive weight loss, or if they had <1000 gs of tissue resected. Clinical outcomes and PROs using the BODY-Q were comparatively analyzed., Results: 70 total patients with median BMIs of 30[26-32] and 41[37-45] kg/m 2 in each cohort, were identified. Patients with BMI ≥35 kg/m 2 were more likely to have higher ASA (P<0.01) and use of incisional negative pressure wound devices (P = 0.042). Alternatively, they were less likely to have had concurrent liposuction (P = 0.05). There were no differences in development of an SSO, SSI or SSOpi (P>0.05) between cohorts. Multivariate logistic regression showed that BMI ≥35 kg/m 2 , iNPWD and liposuction were not associated with the development of complications. PROs demonstrated improvement in multiple domains despite BMI., Conclusion: There was no association with BMI ≥35 kg/m 2 and the development of complications within our cohort. We encourage preoperative weight loss when possible, however these procedures can be performed safely with acceptable outcomes even in individuals who are obese and/or require extensive tissue removal., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)