Dedicated Cancer Centers are More Likely to Achieve a Textbook Outcome Following Hepatopancreatic Surgery

The aim of the current study is to assess rates of textbook outcome (TO) among Medicare beneficiaries undergoing hepatopancreatic (HP) surgery for cancer at dedicated cancer centers (DCCs) and National Cancer Institute affiliated cancer centers (NCI-CCs) versus non-DCC non-NCI hospitals. Medicare Inpatient Standard Analytic Files were utilized to identify patients undergoing HP surgery between 2013 and 2017. TO was defined as no postoperative surgical complications, no 90-day mortality, no prolonged length of hospital stay, and no 90-day readmission after discharge. Among 21,234 Medicare patients, 8.2% patients underwent surgery at DCCs whereas 32.1% underwent surgery at NCI-CCs and 59.7% underwent an operation at neither DCCs nor NCI-CCs. Although DCCs more often cared for patients with severe comorbidities [Charlson score > 5: DCCs, 1195 (68.9%), NCI-CCs, 3687 (54.1%), others, 3970 (31.3%); p