Journal of Anesthesia Analgesia and Critical Care· 2026Q1
Extended recovery room as a strategy to reduce inappropriate ICU admissions: an Italian hospital experience
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- Q1SCImago
- 2026year
Short summary
Extending hospital Recovery Room (RR) hours to 24:00 and holidays, without extra staff, reduced inappropriate ICU admissions by 88% (from 23.83% to 1.18% of monitored patients) and lowered ICU occupancy by 18% (from 91.79% to 73.78%).
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Key points
- Extending Recovery Room (RR) hours reduced inappropriate ICU/intermediate care admissions from 23.83% to 1.18% of monitored surgical patients.
- ICU occupancy decreased from 91.79% to 73.78% after the RR extension.
- The initiative was achieved by reorganizing existing ICU nursing staff, requiring no additional resources.
- Estimated ICU costs decreased by 35.7%, and nursing on-call hours were reduced by 91.7%.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Abstract
The limited operational hours of Recovery Rooms (RR) frequently result in potentially avoidable intensive care unit (ICU) admissions for intermediate-risk surgical patients. "Project Futura," implemented at Santo Stefano Hospital (Prato, Italy) in March 2024, extended RR hours into the evening (until 24:00) and holidays by reorganizing existing ICU nursing staff without additional resources. This retrospective before-after study compared October-December 2023 (pre-intervention) with October-December 2024 (post-intervention). During the post-intervention period, 362 of 1519 surgical patients (23.83%) received extended RR monitoring; only 18 (1.18%) required subsequent ICU/intermediate care unit admission. ICU occupancy decreased from 91.79 to 73.78% (p < 0.0001), extraordinary emergency RR activations dropped from 22 to 0, estimated ICU costs decreased by 35.7%, and nursing on-call hours were reduced by 91.7%. These preliminary findings suggest that extending RR operational hours may represent a safe, cost-efficient strategy to improve the appropriateness of postoperative ICU utilization.
The authors' abstract, as published at the source. Journal of Anesthesia Analgesia and Critical Care, 2026 · DOI ↗
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Field: Critical Care and Intensive Care Medicine
Critical Care and Intensive Care MedicineMedicine