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Eur J Cardiothorac Surg 2006;29:855-856
© 2006 Elsevier Science NL

Letter to the Editor

Potentials and pitfalls of clinical outcome research studies in cardiac surgery

Hemodynamics and Cardiovascular Radiology Service, Policlinico San Donato, San Donato Milanese, Italy

Received 16 January 2006; accepted 7 February 2006.

^_* Corresponding author. Address: Servizio di Emodinamica e Radiologia Cardiovascolare, Centro Cardiovascolare "E. Malan", Policlinico San Donato, Via Morandi 30, 20097 San Donato Milanese (MI), Italy. Tel.: +39 3408626829; fax: +39 0252774585. (Email: gbiondizoccai@gmail.com).

Key Words: Coronary artery disease • Coronary artery bypass graft surgery • Clinical outcome research

The first 20% of the full text of this article appears below.

We read with interest the article by Seccareccia et al. [1] apprasing short-term outcomes of patients undergoing coronary artery bypass graft surgery in Italy, as well as the editorials by Nashef [2] and Menicanti [3]. Specifically, we found intriguing the potential implications for health policy and clinical practice, i.e. the comparison between hospitals according to adjusted outcome rates and focusing possible policy interventions on underperforming surgical centers [4]. However, such interpretation of the results from Seccareccia et al. is limited by a number of methodological drawbacks.

First, the period of enrolment varied largely from center to center. This may . . . [Full Text of this Article]