Smoking and Postoperative Risk in Cardiac Surgery Patients
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Introduction: Smoking affects physiologic functions in various ways. The effects of smoking and cessation on postoperative outcomes have been studied in general and in orthopedic surgery. Regarding patients undergoing cardiac surgery, not many studies about how smoking affects surgical risk have been published. Aim: Examine the association between smoking and time since smoking cessation on postoperative complications. Methods: A retrospective register study was conducted including patients who had an isolated coronary artery bypass (CABG) surgery at Sahlgrenska University Hospital during January 2010-December 2020. Baseline- and outcome variables were collected from Swedish Cardiac Surgery Registry (SWEDEHEART) and smoking status was manually collected from patient records. Comparison of current and never-smokers was made, as well as univariate and multivariate logistic regression for time since smoking cessation. Results: 5072 patients were included, 4645 had smoking status available (1438 never-smokers, 750 current smokers, 2457 previous smokers). Current smokers were younger with significantly higher risk of acute coronary syndrome prior to surgery and compared to patients that had never smoked. Smokers had significantly higher occurrence of pulmonary complications (12.0% vs 5.1%), including pneumonia and prolonged ventilation, as well as higher incidence of post-operative stroke (1.9% vs 0.6%) and infections requiring antibiotics (18.2% vs 7.2%). These complications were statistically significant also after propensity score matching. Both univariate and multivariate logistic regression analysis showed a significant decrease in risk of pulmonary complications and infections with longer time since smoking cessation. In our data, patients with short smoking abstinence before surgery (up to six months) had no statistically significant difference in occurrence of pulmonary complications compared to smokers. Conclusion: Smoking seems to be associated with pulmonary complications and infections after CABG surgery and we found an association between abstinent time from smoking and reduced complications. Improved smoking-prevention and intervention might reduce morbidity in cardiac surgery patients.