'DNR' patients more likely to die following surgery

Patients with Do Not Resuscitate orders are more than twice as likely to die within 30 days of surgery as those without the orders, according to a new study at Yale. The study, led by Hadiza Kazaure, an associate professor of surgery at Yale University School of Medicine, compared the surgical outcomes of 4,128 adult patients with Do Not Resuscitate orders and 4,128 without DNR orders. The two groups were matched for age and types of surgical procedures. The data were collected from more than 120 hospitals between 2005 and 2008. The average age of the subjects was 79. Most were white women. Of the patients with Do Not Resuscitate orders, 23.1% died within 30 days of surgery, compared with 8.4% of the patients without the orders.