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Abstract Mobile health (mHealth) interventions may enhance positive health behaviors, but randomized trials evaluating their efficacy are uncommon. Our goal was to determine if a mHealth intervention augmented and extended benefits of center-based cardiac rehabilitation (CR) for physical activity levels at 6-months. We delivered a randomized clinical trial to low and moderate risk patients with a compatible smartphone enrolled in CR at two health systems. All participants received a compatible smartwatch and usual CR care. Intervention participants received a mHealth intervention that included a just-in-time-adaptive intervention (JITAI) as text messages. The primary outcome was change in remote 6-minute walk distance at 6-months stratified by device type. Here we report the results for 220 participants enrolled in the study (mean [SD]: age 59.6 [10.6] years; 67 [30.5%] women). For our primary outcome at 6 months, there is no significant difference in the change in 6 min walk distance across smartwatch types (Intervention versus control: +31.1 meters Apple Watch, −7.4 meters Fitbit; p = 0.28). Secondary outcomes show no difference in mean step counts between the first and final weeks of the study, but a change in 6 min walk distance at 3 months for Fitbit users. Amongst patients enrolled in center-based CR, a mHealth intervention did not improve 6-month outcomes but suggested differences at 3 months in some users.

Abstract Background The decision about which type of general anesthetic to administer is typically made by the clinical team without patient engagement. This study examined patients’ preferences, experiences, attitudes, beliefs, perceptions, and perceived social norms about anesthesia and about engaging in the decision regarding general anesthetic choice with their clinician. Methods We conducted a survey in the United States, sent to a panel of surgical patients through Qualtrics (Qualtrics, Provo, UT) from March 2022 through May 2022. Questions were developed based on the Theory of Planned Behavior and validated measures were used when available. A patient partner who had experienced both intravenous and inhaled anesthesia contributed to the development and refinement of the questions. Results A total of 806 patients who received general anesthesia for an elective procedure in the last five years completed the survey. 43% of respondents preferred a patient-led decision making role and 28% preferred to share decision making with their clinical team, yet only 7.8% reported being engaged in full shared decision making about the anesthesia they received. Intraoperative awareness, pain, nausea, vomiting and quickly returning to work and usual household activities were important to respondents. Waking up in the middle of surgery was the most commonly reported concern, despite this experience being reported only 8% of the time. Most patients (65%) who searched for information about general anesthesia noted that it took a lot of effort to find the information, and 53% agreed to feeling frustrated during the search. Conclusions Most patients prefer a patient-led or shared decision making process when it comes to their anesthetic care and want to be engaged in the decision. However, only a small percentage of patients reported being fully engaged in the decision. Further studies should inform future shared decision-making tools, informed consent materials, educational materials and framing of anesthetic choices for patients so that they are able to make a choice regarding the anesthetic they receive.

BackgroundThe rising adoption of wearable technology increases the potential to identify arrhythmias. However, specificity of these notifications is poorly defined and may cause anxiety and unnecessary resource utilization. Herein, we report results of a follow-up screening protocol for incident atrial fibrillation/flutter (AF) within a large observational digital health study.MethodsThe MIPACT Study enrolled 6,765 adult patients who were provided an Apple Watch and blood pressure (BP) monitors. From March to July 2019, participants were asked to contact the study team for any irregular heart rate (HR) notification. They were assessed using structured questionnaires and asked to provide 6 Apple Watch EKGs. Those with arrhythmias or non-diagnostic EKGs were sent 7-day monitors. The EHR was reviewed after 3 years to determine if participants developed arrhythmias.Results86 participants received notifications and met inclusion criteria. Mean age was 50.5 (SD 16.9) years, and 46 (53.3%) were female. Of 76 participants assessed by the study team, 32 (42.1%) reported anxiety surrounding notifications. Of 59 participants who sent at least 1 EKG, 52 (88.1%) were in sinus rhythm, 3 (5.1%) AF, 2 (3.4%) indeterminate, and 2 (3.4%) sinus bradycardia. Cardiac monitor demonstrated AF in 2 of 3 participants with AF on Apple Watch EKGs. 2 contacted their PCPs and were diagnosed with AF. In total, 5 cases of AF were diagnosed with 1 additional case identified during EHR review.ConclusionWearable devices produce alarms that can frequently be anxiety provoking. Research is needed to determine the implications of these alarms and appropriate follow-up.

BackgroundMore than 300 million patients undergo surgical procedures requiring anesthesia worldwide annually. There are 2 standard-of-care general anesthesia administration options: inhaled volatile anesthesia (INVA) and total intravenous anesthesia (TIVA). There is limited evidence comparing these methods and their impact on patient experiences and outcomes. Patients often seek this information from sources such as the internet. However, the majority of websites on anesthesia-related topics are not comprehensive, updated, and fully accurate. The quality and availability of web-based patient information about INVA and TIVA have not been sufficiently examined. ObjectiveThis study aimed to (1) assess information on the internet about INVA and TIVA for availability, readability, accuracy, and quality and (2) identify high-quality websites that can be recommended to patients to assist in their anesthesia information-seeking and decision-making. MethodsWeb-based searches were conducted using Google from April 2022 to November 2022. Websites were coded using a coding instrument developed based on the International Patient Decision Aids Standards criteria and adapted to be appropriate for assessing websites describing INVA and TIVA. Readability was calculated with the Flesch-Kincaid (F-K) grade level and the simple measure of Gobbledygook (SMOG) readability formula. ResultsA total of 67 websites containing 201 individual web pages were included for coding and analysis. Most of the websites provided a basic definition of general anesthesia (unconsciousness, n=57, 85%; analgesia, n=47, 70%). Around half of the websites described common side effects of general anesthesia, while fewer described the rare but serious adverse events, such as intraoperative awareness (n=31, 46%), allergic reactions or anaphylaxis (n=29, 43%), and malignant hyperthermia (n=18, 27%). Of the 67 websites, the median F-K grade level was 11.3 (IQR 9.5-12.8) and the median SMOG score was 13.5 (IQR 12.2-14.4), both far above the American Medical Association (AMA) recommended reading level of sixth grade. A total of 51 (76%) websites distinguished INVA versus TIVA as general anesthesia options. A total of 12 of the 51 (24%) websites explicitly stated that there is a decision to be considered about receiving INVA versus TIVA for general anesthesia. Only 10 (20%) websites made any direct comparisons between INVA and TIVA, discussing their positive and negative features. A total of 12 (24%) websites addressed the concept of shared decision-making in planning anesthesia care, but none specifically asked patients to think about which features of INVA and TIVA matter the most to them. ConclusionsWhile the majority of websites described INVA and TIVA, few provided comparisons. There is a need for high-quality patient education and decision support about the choice of INVA versus TIVA to provide accurate and more comprehensive information in a format conducive to patient understanding.

The Epidemiologic Questionnaire (EPI-Q) was established to collect broad, uniform, self-reported health data to supplement electronic health record (EHR) and genotype information from participants in the University of Michigan (UM) Precision Health cohorts. Recruitment of EPI-Q participants, who were already enrolled in 1 of 3 ongoing UM Precision Health cohorts—the Michigan Genomics Initiative, Mental Health Biobank, and Metabolism, Endocrinology, and Diabetes cohorts—began in March 2020. Of 54,043 retrospective invitations, 5,577 individuals enrolled, representing a 10.3% response rate. Of these, 3,502 (63.7%) were female, and the average age was 56.1 years (standard deviation, 15.4). The baseline survey comprises 11 modules on topics including personal and family health history, lifestyle, and cancer screening and history. Additionally, 11 optional modules cover topics including financial toxicity, occupational exposure, and life meaning. The questions are based on standardized and validated instruments used in other cohorts, and we share resources to expedite development of similar surveys. Data are collected via the MyDataHelps platform, which enables current and future participants to share non-Michigan Medicine EHR data. Recruitment is ongoing. Cohort data are available to those with institutional review board approval; for details, contact the Data Office for Clinical and Translational Research (DataOffice@umich.edu).

Abstract Background Prior studies support a genetic basis for postoperative acute kidney injury (AKI). We conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS), assessed the clinical utility of a polygenic risk score (PRS), and estimated the heritable component of AKI in patients who underwent noncardiac surgery. Methods We performed a retrospective large-scale genome-wide association study followed by a meta-analysis of patients who underwent noncardiac surgery at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center (“Vanderbilt” cohort) or Michigan Medicine, the academic medical center of the University of Michigan (“Michigan” cohort). In the Vanderbilt cohort, the relationship between polygenic risk score for estimated glomerular filtration rate and postoperative AKI was also tested to explore the predictive power of aggregating multiple common genetic variants associated with AKI risk. Similarly, in the Vanderbilt cohort genome-wide complex trait analysis was used to estimate the heritable component of AKI due to common genetic variants. Results The study population included 8248 adults in the Vanderbilt cohort (mean [SD] 58.05 [15.23] years, 50.2% men) and 5998 adults in Michigan cohort (56.24 [14.76] years, 49% men). Incident postoperative AKI events occurred in 959 patients (11.6%) and in 277 patients (4.6%), respectively. No loci met genome-wide significance in the GWAS and meta-analysis. PRS for estimated glomerular filtration rate explained a very small percentage of variance in rates of postoperative AKI and was not significantly associated with AKI (odds ratio 1.050 per 1 SD increase in polygenic risk score [95% CI, 0.971–1.134]). The estimated heritability among common variants for AKI was 4.5% (SE = 4.5%) suggesting low heritability. Conclusion The findings of this study indicate that common genetic variation minimally contributes to postoperative AKI after noncardiac surgery, and likely has little clinical utility for identifying high-risk patients.

Introduction Millions of patients receive general anaesthesia for surgery annually. Crucial gaps in evidence exist regarding which technique, propofol total intravenous anaesthesia (TIVA) or inhaled volatile anaesthesia (INVA), yields superior patient experience, safety and outcomes. The aim of this pilot study is to assess the feasibility of conducting a large comparative effectiveness trial assessing patient experiences and outcomes after receiving propofol TIVA or INVA.Methods and analysis This protocol was cocreated by a diverse team, including patient partners with personal experience of TIVA or INVA. The design is a 300-patient, two-centre, randomised, feasibility pilot trial. Patients 18 years of age or older, undergoing elective non-cardiac surgery requiring general anaesthesia with a tracheal tube or laryngeal mask airway will be eligible. Patients will be randomised 1:1 to propofol TIVA or INVA, stratified by centre and procedural complexity. The feasibility endpoints include: (1) proportion of patients approached who agree to participate; (2) proportion of patients who receive their assigned randomised treatment; (3) completeness of outcomes data collection and (4) feasibility of data management procedures. Proportions and 95% CIs will be calculated to assess whether prespecified thresholds are met for the feasibility parameters. If the lower bounds of the 95% CI are above the thresholds of 10% for the proportion of patients agreeing to participate among those approached and 80% for compliance with treatment allocation for each randomised treatment group, this will suggest that our planned pragmatic 12 500-patient comparative effectiveness trial can likely be conducted successfully. Other feasibility outcomes and adverse events will be described.Ethics and dissemination This study is approved by the ethics board at Washington University (IRB# 202205053), serving as the single Institutional Review Board for both participating sites. Recruitment began in September 2022. Dissemination plans include presentations at scientific conferences, scientific publications, internet-based educational materials and mass media.Trial registration number NCT05346588.

Background: The recent integration of genomic data with electronic health records has enabled large scale genomic studies on a variety of perioperative complications, yet genome-wide association studies on acute kidney injury have been limited in size or confounded by composite outcomes. Genome-wide association studies can be leveraged to create a polygenic risk score which can then be integrated with traditional clinical risk factors to better predict postoperative complications, like acute kidney injury.Methods: Using integrated genetic data from two academic biorepositories, we conduct a genome-wide association study on cardiac surgery-associated acute kidney injury. Next, we develop a polygenic risk score and test the predictive utility within regressions controlling for age, gender, principal components, preoperative serum creatinine, and a range of patient, clinical, and procedural risk factors. Finally, we estimate additive variant heritability using genetic mixed models.Results: Among 1,014 qualifying procedures at Vanderbilt University Medical Center and 478 at Michigan Medicine, 348 (34.3%) and 121 (25.3%) developed AKI, respectively. No variants exceeded genome-wide significance (p < 5 × 10−8) threshold, however, six previously unreported variants exceeded the suggestive threshold (p < 1 × 10−6). Notable variants detected include: 1) rs74637005, located in the exonic region of NFU1 and 2) rs17438465, located between EVX1 and HIBADH. We failed to replicate variants from prior unbiased studies of post-surgical acute kidney injury. Polygenic risk was not significantly associated with post-surgical acute kidney injury in any of the models, however, case duration (aOR = 1.002, 95% CI 1.000–1.003, p = 0.013), diabetes mellitus (aOR = 2.025, 95% CI 1.320–3.103, p = 0.001), and valvular disease (aOR = 0.558, 95% CI 0.372–0.835, p = 0.005) were significant in the full model.Conclusion: Polygenic risk score was not significantly associated with cardiac surgery-associated acute kidney injury and acute kidney injury may have a low heritability in this population. These results suggest that susceptibility is only minimally influenced by baseline genetic predisposition and that clinical risk factors, some of which are modifiable, may play a more influential role in predicting this complication. The overall impact of genetics in overall risk for cardiac surgery-associated acute kidney injury may be small compared to clinical risk factors.

Summary: Biobanks of linked clinical patient histories and biological samples are an efficient strategy to generate large cohorts for modern genetics research. Biobank recruitment varies by factors such as geographic catchment and sampling strategy, which affect biobank demographics and research utility. Here, we describe the Michigan Genomics Initiative (MGI), a single-health-system biobank currently consisting of >91,000 participants recruited primarily during surgical encounters at Michigan Medicine. The surgical enrollment results in a biobank enriched for many diseases and ideally suited for a disease genetics cohort. Compared with the much larger population-based UK Biobank, MGI has higher prevalence for nearly all diagnosis-code-based phenotypes and larger absolute case counts for many phenotypes. Genome-wide association study (GWAS) results replicate known findings, thereby validating the genetic and clinical data. Our results illustrate that opportunistic biobank sampling within single health systems provides a unique and complementary resource for exploring the genetics of complex diseases.

Background: Reliable diagnosis of heart failure during preoperative evaluation is important for perioperative management and long-term care. We aimed to quantify preoperative heart failure diagnostic accuracy and explore characteristics of patients with heart failure misdiagnoses. Methods: We performed an observational cohort study of adults undergoing major noncardiac surgery at an academic hospital between 2015 and 2019. A preoperative clinical diagnosis of heart failure was defined using keywords from the history and clinical examination or administrative documentation. Across stratified subsamples of cases with and without clinically diagnosed heart failure, health records were intensively reviewed by an expert panel to develop an adjudicated heart failure reference standard using diagnostic criteria congruent with consensus guidelines. We calculated agreement among experts, and analysed performance of clinically diagnosed heart failure compared with the adjudicated reference standard. Results: Across 40 555 major noncardiac procedures, a stratified subsample of 511 patients was reviewed by the expert panel. The prevalence of heart failure was 9.1% based on clinically diagnosed compared with 13.3% (95% confidence interval [CI], 10.3–16.2%) estimated by the expert panel. Overall agreement and inter-rater reliability (kappa) among heart failure experts were 95% and 0.79, respectively. Based upon expert adjudication, heart failure was clinically diagnosed with an accuracy of 92.8% (90.6–95.1%), sensitivity 57.4% (53.1–61.7%), specificity 98.3% (97.1–99.4%), positive predictive value 83.5% (80.3–86.8%), and negative predictive value 93.8% (91.7–95.9%). Conclusions: Limitations exist to the preoperative clinical diagnosis of heart failure, with nearly half of cases undiagnosed preoperatively. Considering the risks of undiagnosed heart failure, efforts to improve preoperative heart failure diagnoses are warranted.

Background: High airway driving pressure is associated with adverse outcomes in critically ill patients receiving mechanical ventilation, but large multicentre studies investigating airway driving pressure during major surgery are lacking. We hypothesised that increased driving pressure is associated with postoperative pulmonary complications in patients undergoing major abdominal surgery. Methods: In this preregistered multicentre retrospective observational cohort study, the authors reviewed major abdominal surgical procedures in 11 hospitals from 2004 to 2018. The primary outcome was a composite of postoperative pulmonary complications, defined as postoperative pneumonia, unplanned tracheal intubation, or prolonged mechanical ventilation for more than 48 h. Associations between intraoperative dynamic driving pressure and outcomes, adjusted for patient and procedural factors, were evaluated. Results: Among 14 218 qualifying cases, 389 (2.7%) experienced postoperative pulmonary complications. After adjustment, the mean dynamic driving pressure was associated with postoperative pulmonary complications (adjusted odds ratio for every 1 cm H2O increase: 1.04; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.02–1.06; P

BackgroundThe automated acquisition of intraoperative patient temperature data via temperature probes leads to the possibility of producing a number of artifacts related to probe positioning that may impact these probes’ utility for observational research. ObjectiveWe sought to compare the performance of two de novo algorithms for filtering such artifacts. MethodsIn this observational retrospective study, the intraoperative temperature data of adults who received general anesthesia for noncardiac surgery were extracted from the Multicenter Perioperative Outcomes Group registry. Two algorithms were developed and then compared to the reference standard—anesthesiologists’ manual artifact detection process. Algorithm 1 (a slope-based algorithm) was based on the linear curve fit of 3 adjacent temperature data points. Algorithm 2 (an interval-based algorithm) assessed for time gaps between contiguous temperature recordings. Sensitivity and specificity values for artifact detection were calculated for each algorithm, as were mean temperatures and areas under the curve for hypothermia (temperatures below 36 °C) for each patient, after artifact removal via each methodology. ResultsA total of 27,683 temperature readings from 200 anesthetic records were analyzed. The overall agreement among the anesthesiologists was 92.1%. Both algorithms had high specificity but moderate sensitivity (specificity: 99.02% for algorithm 1 vs 99.54% for algorithm 2; sensitivity: 49.13% for algorithm 1 vs 37.72% for algorithm 2; F-score: 0.65 for algorithm 1 vs 0.55 for algorithm 2). The areas under the curve for time × hypothermic temperature and the mean temperatures recorded for each case after artifact removal were similar between the algorithms and the anesthesiologists. ConclusionsThe tested algorithms provide an automated way to filter intraoperative temperature artifacts that closely approximates manual sorting by anesthesiologists. Our study provides evidence demonstrating the efficacy of highly generalizable artifact reduction algorithms that can be readily used by observational studies that rely on automated intraoperative data acquisition.

Drugs targeting cardiovascular disease (CVD) can have negative consequences for liver function. Here, the authors combine genome wide analyses on 69,479 individuals to identify loss-of-function variants with beneficial effects on CVD-related traits without negative impacts on liver function.

Abstract Background While pre and postoperative hyperglycemia is associated with increased risk of surgical site infection, myocardial infarction, stroke and risk of death, there are no multicenter data regarding the association of intraoperative blood glucose levels and outcomes for the non-cardiac surgical population. Methods We conducted a retrospective cohort study from the Michigan Surgical Quality Collaborative, a network of 64 hospitals that prospectively collects validated data on surgical patients for the purpose of quality improvement. We included data for adult general, vascular, endocrine, hepatobiliary, and gastrointestinal operations between 2013 and 2015. We assessed the risk-adjusted, independent relationship between intraoperative hyperglycemia (glucose > 180) and the primary outcome of 30-day morbidity/mortality and secondary outcome of infectious complications using multivariable logistic regression modelling. Post hoc sensitivity analysis to assess the association between blood glucose values ≥250 mg/dL and outcomes was also performed. Results Ninety-two thousand seven hundred fifty-one patients underwent surgery between 2013 and 2015 and 5014 (5.4%) had glucose testing intra-operatively. Of these patients, 1647 patients (32.9%) experienced the primary outcome, and 909 (18.1%) the secondary outcome. After controlling for patient comorbidities and surgical factors, peak intraoperative glucose > 180 mg/dL was not an independent predictor of 30-day mortality/morbidity (adjusted OR 1.05, 95%CI:0.86 to 1.28; p-value 0.623; model c-statistic of 0.720) or 30-day infectious complications (adjusted OR 0.93, 95%CI:0.74,1.16; p 0.502; model c-statistic of 0.709). Subgroup analysis for patients with or without diabetes yielded similar results. Sensitivity analysis demonstrated blood glucose of 250 mg/dL was a predictor of 30-day mortality/morbidity (adjusted OR: 1.59, 95% CI: 1.24, 2.05; p 180 mg/ dL compared to patients with glucose values ≤180 mg/ dL.

Summary: Background: Wearable technology has rapidly entered consumer markets and has health-care potential; however, wearable device data for diverse populations are scarce. We therefore aimed to describe and compare key wearable signals (ie, heart rate, step count, and home blood pressure measurements) across age, sex, race, ethnicity, and clinical phenotypes. Methods: In the Michigan Predictive Activity & Clinical Trajectories in Health (MIPACT) prospective observational study, we enrolled participants from Michigan Medicine, Ann Abor, MI, USA, and followed them up for at least 90 days. Patients were included if they were aged 18 years or older, were fluent in English, owned an iPhone 6 or newer model with a supported iOS version, and had regular access to the internet throughout the study period. All participants were provided with an Apple Watch Series 3 or 4, an Omron Evolv Wireless Blood Pressure Monitor, and the MyDataHelps study smartphone application. Participants were asked to wear their watch for 12 h per day or longer and to do daily or weekly tasks, including home blood pressure measurements and breathing tasks. Heart rate, blood pressure, step counts, and distance walked were collected. The study was divided into two phases: an intensive 45-day collection phase (phase 1); and a 3-year longitudinal monitoring phase (phase 2). Here we report the first 90 days of data for all participants, which includes all of phase 1 and the first 45 days of phase 2. Participants’ electronic health records were used to establish clinical diagnoses for analysis. Findings: We enrolled 6765 eligible participants between Aug 14, 2018, and Dec 19, 2019, of whom 6454 participants from Michigan Medicine completed the phase 1 study protocol and were included in this analysis (3482 [54%] women and 2972 [46%] men; 3657 [57%] participants were White, with 1094 [17%] Asian and 1090 [17%] Black participants). On days when participants wore their smart watches, median daily watch wear time was 15·5 h (IQR 14–17). Participants contributed a total of 1 107 320 blood pressure and 202 198 347 heart rate measurements over 90 days, with 172 (SD 50) blood pressure and 31 329 (SD 24 620) heart rate measurements per participant. Mean systolic blood pressure was 122 mm Hg (SD 10) and mean diastolic blood pressure was 77 mm Hg (SD 8), with 167 312 (15%) measurements having a systolic blood pressure higher than 140 mm Hg or diastolic blood pressure higher than 90 mm Hg. Mean resting heart rate was 64 beats per min (SD 8). Blood pressure and resting heart rate varied by sex, age, race, and ethnicity, with higher blood pressures in males and lower heart rate in participants aged 65 years or older (p

Estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) is a measure of kidney function and used to characterize chronic kidney disease. Here, Graham et al. identify 53 novel loci for eGFR in a GWAS meta-analysis, a subset of which are associated with other common diseases, such as diabetes and hypertension, based on PheWAS.

Phenotypes extracted from Electronic Health Records (EHRs) are increasingly prevalent in genetic studies. EHRs contain hundreds of distinct clinical laboratory test results, providing a trove of health data beyond diagnoses. Such lab data is complex and lacks a ubiquitous coding scheme, making it more challenging than diagnosis data. Here we describe the first large-scale cross-health system genome-wide association study (GWAS) of EHR-based quantitative laboratory-derived phenotypes. We meta-analyzed 70 lab traits matched between the BioVU cohort from the Vanderbilt University Health System and the Michigan Genomics Initiative (MGI) cohort from Michigan Medicine. We show high replication of known association for these traits, validating EHR-based measurements as high-quality phenotypes for genetic analysis. Notably, our analysis provides the first replication for 699 previous GWAS associations across 46 different traits. We discovered 31 novel associations at genome-wide significance for 22 distinct traits, including the first reported associations for two lab-based traits. We replicated 22 of these novel associations in an independent tranche of BioVU samples. The summary statistics for all association tests are freely available to benefit other researchers. Finally, we performed mirrored analyses in BioVU and MGI to assess competing analytic practices for EHR lab traits. We find that using the mean of all available lab measurements provides a robust summary value, but alternate summarizations can improve power in certain circumstances. This study provides a proof-of-principle for cross health system GWAS and is a framework for future studies of quantitative EHR lab traits.

Introduction: Perioperative morbidity is a public health priority, and surgical volume is increasing rapidly. With advances in technology, there is an opportunity to research the utility of a telemedicine-based control center for anesthesia clinicians that assess risk, diagnoses negative patient trajectories, and implements evidence-based practices. Objectives: The primary objective of this trial is to determine whether an anesthesiology control tower (ACT) prevents clinically relevant adverse postoperative outcomes including 30-day mortality, delirium, respiratory failure, and acute kidney injury. Secondary objectives are to determine whether the ACT improves perioperative quality of care metrics including management of temperature, mean arterial pressure, mean airway pressure with mechanical ventilation, blood glucose, anesthetic concentration, antibiotic redosing, and efficient fresh gas flow. Methods and analysis: We are conducting a single center, randomized, controlled, phase 3 pragmatic clinical trial. A total of 58 operating rooms are randomized daily to receive support from the ACT or not. All adults (eighteen years and older) undergoing surgical procedures in these operating rooms are included and followed until 30 days after their surgery. Clinicians in operating rooms randomized to ACT support receive decision support from clinicians in the ACT. In operating rooms randomized to no intervention, the current standard of anesthesia care is delivered. The intention-to-treat principle will be followed for all analyses. Differences between groups will be presented with 99% confidence intervals; p-values

Abstract Background Perioperative hyperglycemia and its associated increase in morbidity and mortality have been well studied in the critical care and cardiac surgery literature. However, there is little data regarding the impact of intraoperative hyperglycemia on post-operative infectious complications in non-cardiac surgery. Methods All National Surgery Quality Improvement Program patients undergoing general, vascular, and urological surgery at our tertiary care center were reviewed. After integrating intraoperative glucose measurements from our intraoperative electronic health record, we categorized patients as experiencing mild (8.3–11.0 mmol/L), moderate (11.1–16.6 mmol/L), and severe (≥ 16.7 mmol/L) intraoperative hyperglycemia. Using multiple logistic regression to adjust for patient comorbidities and surgical factors, we evaluated the association of hyperglycemia with the primary outcome of postoperative surgical site infection, pneumonia, urinary tract infection, or sepsis within 30 days. Results Of 13,954 patients reviewed, 3150 patients met inclusion criteria and had an intraoperative glucose measurement. 49% (n = 1531) of patients experienced hyperglycemia and 15% (n = 482) patients experienced an infectious complication. Patients with mild (adjusted odds ratio 1.30, 95% confidence interval [1.01 to 1.68], p-value = 0.04) and moderate hyperglycemia (adjusted odds ratio 1.57, 95% confidence interval [1.08–2.28], p-value = 0.02) had a statistically significant risk-adjusted increase in infectious complications. The model c-statistic was 0.72 [95% confidence interval 0.69–0.74]. Conclusions This is one of the first studies to demonstrate an independent relationship between intraoperative hyperglycemia and postoperative infectious complications. Future studies are needed to evaluate a causal relationship and impact of treatment.

Bicuspid aortic valve (BAV) is the most common human congenital cardiovascular malformation. Here, the authors perform a genome-wide association study for BAV and identify risk variants in the gene region of cardiac-specific transcription factor GATA4 and implicate GATA4 in heart valve development.

Polygenic risk scores (PRS) are designed to serve as single summary measures that are easy to construct, condensing information from a large number of genetic variants associated with a disease. They have been used for stratification and prediction of disease risk. The primary focus of this paper is to demonstrate how we can combine PRS and electronic health records data to better understand the shared and unique genetic architecture and etiology of disease subtypes that may be both related and heterogeneous. PRS construction strategies often depend on the purpose of the study, the available data/summary estimates, and the underlying genetic architecture of a disease. We consider several choices for constructing a PRS using data obtained from various publicly-available sources including the UK Biobank and evaluate their abilities to predict not just the primary phenotype but also secondary phenotypes derived from electronic health records (EHR). This study was conducted using data from 30,702 unrelated, genotyped patients of recent European descent from the Michigan Genomics Initiative (MGI), a longitudinal biorepository effort within Michigan Medicine. We examine the three most common skin cancer subtypes in the USA: basal cell carcinoma, cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma, and melanoma. Using these PRS for various skin cancer subtypes, we conduct a phenome-wide association study (PheWAS) within the MGI data to evaluate PRS associations with secondary traits. PheWAS results are then replicated using population-based UK Biobank data and compared across various PRS construction methods. We develop an accompanying visual catalog called PRSweb that provides detailed PheWAS results and allows users to directly compare different PRS construction methods.

An educational intervention was implemented at the University of Michigan starting in 2008, in which anesthesiology interns complete a dedicated month-long didactic rotation in evidence-based medicine (EBM) and research methodology. We sought to assess its utility. Scores on a validated EBM test before and after the rotation were compared and assessed for significance of improvement. A survey was also given to gauge satisfaction with the quality of the rotation and self-reported improvement in understanding of EBM topics. Fourteen consecutive interns completed the research rotation during the study period. One hundred percent completed both the pre- and postrotation test. The mean pretest score was 7.78 ± 2.46 (median = 7.5, 0–15 scale, and interquartile range 7.0–10.0) and the mean posttest score was 10.00 ± 2.35 (median = 9.5, interquartile range 8.0–12.3), which represented a statistically significant increase (P=0.011, Wilcoxon signed-rank test). All fourteen of the residents “agreed” or “strongly agreed” that they would recommend the course to future interns and that the course increased their ability to critically review the literature. Our findings demonstrate that this can be an effective means of improving understanding of EBM topics and anesthesiology research.