Surgical, Obstetric, and Anesthetic Mortality Measurement at a Ugandan Secondary Referral Hospital

( Anesth Analg . 2021;133:1608–1616) In low- and middle-income countries, health care systems may have limited ability to safely treat surgical disorders. An appropriate standardized metric is needed to assess hospital and patient outcomes in terms of safe surgical care in low-income countries. The perioperative mortality rate (POMR) is one metric used to compare the quality and safety of hospitals in high- and low-income countries. In Uganda, the Mbarara Regional Referral Hospital (MRRH) is a government-funded hospital located in a rural area. This study examined surgical deaths over one year at this hospital with the aim of determining a suitable mortality metric to measure outcomes and assess care delivery in this limited-resource health system. The hypothesis was that the majority of admission deaths did not involve an operation.