Togus to resume surgeries after recent halt

AUGUSTA – The Veterans Affairs Medical Center at Togus plans to reinstate surgical procedures that were discontinued over the summer.

The surgeries, which were halted after a federal review said they needed improvement, could resume as early as next month.

In July, representatives of the federal National Surgical Quality Improvement Program visited Togus to evaluate surgical conditions and data and review the number of patients who had died within 30 days of surgeries at the hospital.

Afterward, veterans needing certain types of surgery, including abdominal and lung operations, were sent to other Maine hospitals and the veterans center in West Roxbury, Mass.

While denying that the hospital performed some surgeries poorly, medical center Director Jack Sims said Togus would improve procedures in surgery wards based on the evaluation. The hospital hopes to bring some of the surgeries back on line by late October, he said.

Several physicians said the review group based its findings on inaccurate information.

For instance, the federal review counted postsurgical deaths caused by vehicular accidents, a suicide and advanced forms of cancer, said Dr. Martin Vickers, an oncologist at Togus.

The federal review also used faulty data that led to the elimination of some in-house surgeries, said Dr. Dana Briggs, chief of anesthesia.

He said the physicians would welcome an independent review.

Because Togus performs a relatively small number of bowel, colon, kidney and lung operations, the number of patients who die within 30 days is skewed when compared to large city hospitals that do multiple operations each day, Briggs and Vickers said.

For a number of years, Togus scored well above the average threshold for postsurgical numbers. In recent years, a greater number of patients have entered the federal hospital with advanced cases of illness, Vickers said.

A team from the New England regional veterans center visited Togus last Friday, Sims said.

“They helped us with some recommendations,” he said.