A fast-track program is a well-established approach for a patient undergoing elective operations. With increasing life expectancy, the number of patients undergoing knee replacement surgeries is expected to increase. In my experience, I find a decrease in the days of hospitalization in a joint replacement surgery from 7 days in 2010 to 3 days in 2020. While my colleagues in the West have already begun implementing this surgery as a daycare procedure, it will hopefully be the same in India soon.
The program is multimodal and multidisciplinary, involving surgeons, anaesthesiologists, physiotherapists, nurses, and even trained help. The principle is to increase patient satisfaction, confidence, and lower hospital-acquired morbidity. It consists of careful patient selection, preoperative care, minimizing perioperative stresses, and decreasing post-operative discomfort. FAST-TRACK SURGICAL…
