• Taylor S Riall, Karl A Eschbach, Courtney M Townsend, William H Nealon, Jean L Freeman, and James S Goodwin.
• Department of Surgery, University of Texas Medical Branch, 301 University Boulevard, Galveston, TX 77555-0542, USA. tsriall@utmb.edu
• J. Gastrointest. Surg. 2007 Oct 1; 11 (10): 1242-51; discussion 1251-2.

BackgroundThe current recommendation is that pancreatic resections be performed at hospitals doing >10 pancreatic resections annually.ObjectiveTo evaluate the extent of regionalization of pancreatic resection and the factors predicting resection at high-volume centers (>10 cases/year) in Texas.MethodsUsing the Texas Hospital Inpatient Discharge Public Use Data File, we evaluated trends in the percentage of patients undergoing pancreatic resection at high-volume centers (>10 cases/year) from 1999 to 2004 and determined the factors that independently predicted resection at high-volume centers.ResultsA total of 3,189 pancreatic resections were performed in the state of Texas. The unadjusted in-hospital mortality was higher at low-volume centers (7.4%) compared to high-volume centers (3.0%). Patients resected at high-volume centers increased from 54.5% in 1999 to 63.3% in 2004 (P = 0.0004). This was the result of a decrease in resections performed at centers doing less than five resections/year (35.5% to 26.0%). In a multivariate analysis, patients who were >75 (OR = 0.51), female (OR = 0.86), Hispanic (OR = 0.58), having emergent surgery (OR = 0.39), diagnosed with periampullary cancer (OR = 0.68), and living >75 mi from a high-volume center (OR = 0.93 per 10-mi increase in distance, P < 0.05 for all OR) were less likely to be resected at high-volume centers. The odds of being resected at a high-volume center increased 6% per year.ConclusionsWhereas regionalization of pancreatic resection at high-volume centers in the state of Texas has improved slightly over time, 37% of patients continue to undergo pancreatic resection at low-volume centers, with more than 25% occurring at centers doing less than five per year. There are obvious demographic disparities in the regionalization of care, but additional unmeasured barriers need to be identified.

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