Perioperative mortality and associated factors in patients undergoing radical nephrectomy.
OBJECTIVE
To determine the incidence and related factors of perioperative mortality associated with radical nephrectomy in patients with renal tumours in a tertiary hospital.


MATERIAL AND METHODS
We conducted a cross-sectional study that reviewed the medical records of patients undergoing radical nephrectomy between January 1, 2007 and December 31, 2011 in a tertiary university hospital (Cali, Colombia). We measured sociodemographic variables and factors that may be associated with perioperative mortality. The statistical analysis was performed using STATA.


RESULTS
We analysed 57 patients who underwent radical nephrectomy, 54.4% of whom were male, whose ages ranged from 14 to 81 years. All tumours had a unilateral presentation; 96.5% of the tumours were solid renal lesions, and 3.5% were cystic lesions. The most frequent histological findings were clear cell (63.2%), papillary (8.7%) and chromophobe cell (5.2%) renal carcinoma. There were no complications in 27 (47.3%) of the patients. According to the Clavien-Dindo classification of surgical complications, 16 (28%) patients had minor (grades i and ii) complications and 9 (15.6%) had major (grades iii and iv) complications, with an overall perioperative mortality (grade v) of 8.7% (5 patients).


CONCLUSIONS
The perioperative mortality at 30 days for patients with nonmetastatic renal carcinoma who underwent radical nephrectomy at a tertiary university hospital in Cali, Colombia, was 4.1% (2 patients).