Study Design
All open cardiac surgery patients at a single academic institution in 2018 were retrospectively reviewed. Those who did not receive an intraoperative TEG or had incomplete TEG data were excluded. TEG was used to group patients according to fibrinolysis phenotypes. Otherwise, there were no exclusions based on age, medical co-morbidities, or other demographic information. The retrospective study was approved by the institutional review board with waiver of consent.
Demographic, clinical, and outcomes data were compared between groups. Demographic data included age, sex, race, ethnicity, insurance status, and medical comorbidities. Clinical variables included specific cardiac operation, total operative time, any intra-operative or post-operative surgical complications, and all peri-operative and post-operative medications. Outcomes of interest included estimated blood loss (EBL), post-operative length of stay (LOS), chest tube days, total chest tube output, number of packed red blood cells (pRBCs) transfused, all cause morbidity, and mortality (defined as disability and/or death from, cardiac arrest, cerebrovascular accident, congestive heart failure, hemothorax, multiorgan failure myocardial infarction, pleural effusion, respiratory failure, sepsis, thromboembolism, valve dysfunction, and/or wound dehiscence/abscess).