The Big Five

BIG-5: The incidence and severity of the five most common complications in surgical patients: a prospective cohort study

Can music prevent the five most frequent complications of hospitalization? A great number of surgical interventions are performed in the Netherlands. Perioperative anxiety, pain, stress, sleep disturbances and delirium in the older patient seem to be the most common in-hospital factors disturbing the patients mental state of wellbeing, which negatively influence recovery and should be prevented.

Unfortunately, little is known about the incidence and severity of these factors, regardless of their negative effects for the patient. In addition, the awareness of health care professionals of these factors seems to be very low. Therefore this prospective cohort study will evaluate the incidence and severity of these factors and study correlations between the severity and health related outcomes in hospitalized surgical patients.

The primary outcome is the incidence and severity of anxiety, stress, pain, sleep disturbances, and delirium in adult surgical patients using questionnaires and data from electronic medical records.