FREQUENCY OF DEVELOPMENT OF POST-OPERATIVE DELIRIUM IN ADULT CARDIAC SURGERY PATIENTS IN A SINGLE CENTRE

Abstract

The study is an appraisal of postoperative delirium of grown-up patients who undergo cardiac heart surgery in an institution run by a cardiac care unit. Postoperative delirium is a neuropsychiatric disease with dire outcomes and impacts on the results of a patient, the days of hospital stay, and the health expenditure. This was a cross-sectional observational study conducted in the Department of Cardiac Surgery, Khyber Teaching Hospital, Peshawar, whereby it involved a total of 167 patients aged between 18-75 years who were being operated on to undergo elective and emergency cardiac surgical procedures. The inclusion criteria consisted of patients who had subjected themselves to coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG), valve repair/valve replacement, and the combination of both operations. The notable finding was the occurrence of postoperative delirium tested by the Confusion Assessment Method in the ICU (CAM-ICU) less than 72 hours after the surgery. The results showed that 28.1 percent (47 of 167) of the patients underwent postoperative delirium. The lengthy course of cardiopulmonary bypass (more than 120 minutes), early cognitive impairment, advanced age (more than 65 years), and long extended periods of mechanical ventilator use were determined as determining risk factors. The median time to the occurrence of delirium was 18.4 hours post-operatively. The length of stay in the ICU and the total hospital stay of delirium patients was longer than that of controls (4.8 vs. 2.1 days, p < 0.001; 12.3 vs. 7.6 days, p < 0.001). The study is a great avenue to learn more about the incidence and risk factors of postoperative delirium in cardiac surgery patients and the fact that there is a need to discover the predisposing individuals early enough to tell them through early prevention methods.

Keywords: Postoperative delirium, cardiac surgery, CAM-ICU, risk factors, ICU stay, coronary artery bypass grafting.

https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17698023