3 American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality Improvement Program Participant Use Data File (ACS-NSQIP)

3.1 Organization

American College of Surgeons (ACS)

3.3 Description

  • HIPAA-compliant data file
  • De-identified, adult, patient-level, aggregate data
  • Major surgical procedures, inpatient and outpatient
  • Cases submitted to the ACS NSQIP by participating sites that received risk-adjusted reports
  • Over 150 variables, including preoperative risk factors, intraoperative variables, and 30- day postoperative mortality and morbidity outcomes
  • Main dataset along with surgical targeted datasets

3.4 Vintage/Release Frequency

Annual since 2005

3.5 Observational Unit

Cases (patient-level) submitted by hospitals

3.6 Collection Methodology

  • Data captured by a Surgical Clinical Reviewer through chart abstraction and other methods
  • Portions of data may have been automatically populated by software designed to extract from existing hospital information systems
  • Auditing performed on a sample of cases at each site; those not meeting certain criteria are not included in the dataset
  • Smaller sites may provide all eligible cases; other sites may use systematic sampling

3.9 Cost

Free for download for those with an appointment at a participating site

3.10 Proposal or Application required?

Yes

3.11 DUA required?

Yes

3.12 Special Notes

NA