Incidental findings during a surgical procedure patient and public perspectives
Andr van Rij, Jamie Thomas, Rachel McKenzie, Jasper Diong, Frank Frizelle, Jeanne Snelling, Lynley Anderson
When surgeons carrying out an operation incidentally find an unrelated problem, should they go ahead and treat this at the same surgery or wait for another time until having discussed it with the patient? This question was asked of patients awaiting surgery, and the public, to see what they thought were the important things to consider and what they would want to be done by their surgeon in different circumstances. These included whether it was an emergency or not, whether the extra surgery could lead to serious complications or if this might avoid another operation. The results showed that patients and public approached the options similarly although patients more often preferred to go on with the treatment of the IF at the same surgery. Both groups considered the opportunity to avoid another operation to be important. Generally, they preferred for surgeons to discuss the possibility of an incidental finding (IF) during the surgical consent process, although some were not so keen as it might confuse the situation. The preferences were very similar to the way surgeons approached an IF in the same situation as described in the previous paper.
