Postoperative pulmonary complications and their prevention

Postoperative pulmonary complications are common. Despite advances in perioperative care for patients undergoing major surgery, they are associated with increased morbidity, mortality and healthcare costs. Strategies to reduce postoperative pulmonary complications include identification of patients at risk for respiratory complications, followed by risk stratification and perioperative optimization. This article evaluates current literature on the definition of postoperative pulmonary complications, their underlying biological mechanisms, contributing risk factors and preventative measures. Of note, the wide variability in the definition of postoperative pulmonary complications highlights the importance of identifying outcome measures and standardized end points as they affect the validity of clinical trials. Validated risk prediction models are useful tools for clinicians to stratify patients at risk, however there is still a lack of consensus over which model is the best one to use. Evidence for preventative measures including smoking cessation, correction of anaemia, perioperative respiratory physiotherapy and intraoperative management including lung-protective ventilation and goal-directed haemodynamic therapy are discussed. Most importantly, perioperative care bundles demonstrate the importance of multidisciplinary involvement during different time points when a patient undergoes surgery, and a combination of interventions are found to be more beneficial than individual interventions alone.