Abstract

PURPOSE
The study was designed to identify the factors that influence the length of stay of elderly people in the recovery room.
METHODS
The design of the study was descriptive correlation. The subjects were 196 general anesthesia patients. The data were analyzed by SPSS/WIN 17.0 program.
RESULTS
The average length of stay in the recovery room was 62.62 minutes. The length of stay in the recovery room was influenced by age (27.50%); number of diseases (12.97%) and albumin level (6.75%). Other related post operative factors (30.98%) were abnormal ABGA, shivering, PAR score, pain, arrhythmia, amount of bleeding, cardiovascular complication, hypertension and delirium. Those factors explained 78.2% out of the total variance of the length of stay. The strongest effector was the abnormal ABGA (beta=.226) and then shivering (beta=.222).
CONCLUSION
The influencing factors should be assessed and monitored for the aged before and after surgery. Further research is needed to find the exact factors for ICU transfer elderly from recovery room and emergency surgery target.