Perioperative medicine & outcomes
Evaluating Shivering and Hypothermia After Removing Forced‐Air Heating From Short‐Duration Surgery
Authors' conclusion
Omitting forced-air heating significantly increased hypothermia occurrence by 2.85% and shivering by 2.18%, while reducing costs and carbon emissions.
Study context
- Population
- Adults undergoing orthopaedic or abdominal procedures below 90 min, surgical ward of a secondary university hospital, 2023surgeries
- Participants
- 1,059 vs 1,106
- Exposure
- No heating vs active forced-air heating after a guideline change
- Heatingn = 1,059reference
- No-heatingn = 1,106
- Outcome
- Co-primary: intraoperative hypothermia (< 35.5°C) and shivering (symptom or need for rescue medication) in the PACU
Methodological detailspragmatic, co-primary outcomes, Data extracted from electronic health records, Protocol on Zenodo prior to data analysis
- Pragmatic
- Co-primary outcomes
- Data extracted from electronic health records
- Protocol on Zenodo prior to data analysis
Main finding
As reported in the abstract
No-heating vs HeatingRelative risk (97.5% CI)P value
Intraoperative hypothermia
2.04(1.11–3.95)
P = 0.011Shivering
1.55(1.02–2.41)
P = 0.021Observational data: associations, not effects.
Further findings
Cost and emissions to prevent one shivering event
- Cost to prevent one shivering event
- $235
- CO2 equivalents to prevent one shivering event
- 62.9 kg
Anaesthesia emergence time, need for/length of PACU stay
- No differences
Original publication
Evaluating Shivering and Hypothermia After Removing Forced‐Air Heating From Short‐Duration Surgery. Acta Anaesthesiol Scand. Published 16 February 2026. doi:10.
Composed by AI from the published abstract and checked against it. How Briefs are made →