Is preoperative anemia a significant risk factor for splenectomy patients? A NSQIP analysis.

Our results demonstrate a dose-response relationship between increasing degree of anemia and odds of various postoperative adverse outcomes after adjusting for several potential confounders. The subset analysis further suggests that elective splenectomy cases are more likely to have poor outcomes when in the presence of anemia or when transfusions are performed as compared to emergent cases. This suggests that the harm associated with transfusion may offset the benefit of optimizing anemia in an elective splenectomy case.