A new study published in Spine examines the infection rate for the Scoliosis Research Society morbidity and mortality database and compares it to the American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality Improvement Program database.
The researchers used ICD-9 codes to group patients entered into the databases from 2012 and 2013. The researchers found:
1. The SRS database had overall slightly lower acute postoperative infection rates than the ASC-NSQIP database — 1.21 percent compared to 2.05 percent.
2. The infection rates were similar for most diagnoses between the two databases. These diagnoses include:
• Scoliosis
• Spondylolisthesis
• Kyphosis
3. Scheuermann kyphosis, degenerative spondylolisthesis and idiopathic scoliosis were the only areas where differences were noted. The difference for Scheuermann kyphosis was 5.49 percent; degenerative spondylolisthesis was 0.69 percent; idiopathic scoliosis was 1.1 percent for age 10 to 18 year olds and 1.28 percent for adults.
4. The researchers concluded, "Although some statistical differences were found in infection rates between the surgeon-reported SRS database and the chart-abstracted ACS-NSQIP database, these small differences likely reflect differences in surgical cases and data collection methods."
5. The study supports surgeon-reported SRS morbidity and mortality database validity.