Breast and thoracic surgery: at Negrar, an end to fasting and the use of ‘green’ anaesthesia
The IRCCS hospital in Verona has achieved dual ERAS certification following the award of the ‘seal of approval’ to its colorectal and bariatric departments
Resuming eating sooner – 2 hours after surgery rather than after more than 24 hours – reducing the use of inhaled anaesthetic gases and utilising robotics as a tool for sustainability – to minimise material waste and the number of devices required during the procedure – shortens hospital stays and reduces complications by combining clinical quality, technological innovation and environmental sustainability.
Clinical results that speak for themselves, confirmed by new data collected at the IRCCS in Negrar, the first centre in Italia to have obtained dual ERAS certification, with complications more than halved and the average length of stay reduced by one day for breast surgery, and the elimination of readmissions within 30 days and of severe complications in thoracic surgery. Having set the standard as Italia’s first ERAS training centre for bariatric and colorectal surgery, is now extending its record of excellence to two further surgical fields, making the IRCCS in Negrar a benchmark in the field of modern surgery, offering patients cutting-edge care as well as a reduction in healthcare costs.
Eat sooner to recover faster
The old myth about prolonged fasting before and after surgery is now a thing of the past. The latest scientific evidence compiled in the ERAS protocol shows that resuming eating two hours after surgery reduces complications, shortens hospital stays and tangibly improves the quality of recovery.
For decades, it was believed that the digestive tract should remain at rest for a long time after an operation, whilst waiting for the classic ‘first bowel sounds’. This belief needs to be overturned. Early resumption of feeding stimulates bowel motility and counteracts catabolism – that is, the mechanism by which the body, when deprived of nutrients, begins to ‘break down’ its own muscles to obtain energy.
Small, frequent meals, with a focus on protein sources, and fluids taken separately from meals thus replace the long fasts of the past – lasting more than 24 hours – with an active, personalised nutritional programme. The result is a simple yet significant finding: a patient who eats sooner, walks sooner and is discharged sooner, with benefits for healthcare costs as well.
This realisation has given rise to *Recipes for Healing and Wellbeing*, a book produced in collaboration with Academia Barilla – the Barilla Group’s centre of gastronomic excellence, dedicated to promoting Italian culinary culture – which was unveiled for the first time at the ERAS Italia P.O.I.S. (Perioperative Italian Society) national congress that has just concluded in Verona. Twenty-eight recipes, designed for the different stages of a patient’s journey, explain what to eat before surgery to optimise nutritional status, how to adapt one’s diet to the type of operation undergone, right through to the first meals after surgery and the return to normal eating habits once back at home. A practical way of translating a scientific principle into real, practical and enjoyable meals for those undergoing surgery.
