The British journal of surgery
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Venous thromboembolism (VTE) in patients with upper gastrointestinal (GI) cancer increases morbidity and mortality. This study aimed to determine the prevalence of VTE at diagnosis of upper GI cancer. ⋯ The prevalence of VTE at cancer diagnosis was significantly higher in patients with pancreaticobiliary tract cancer than in those with other forms of upper GI cancer, and in patients with advanced cancer stage.
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The Physiological and Operative Severity Score for the enUmeration of Mortality and morbidity (POSSUM) is a well validated model for the prediction of perioperative mortality and morbidity with application to surgery and intensive care medicine. The outcome measure calculations are time-consuming, complex and potentially error-prone. Nomograms are low-cost easy-to-use graphic devices that can be used to make repeated calculations to an acceptable level of accuracy for most clinical purposes. This paper describes a nomogram to aid calculation of POSSUM scores. ⋯ The nomogram provides a rapid, accurate, low-cost means of performing, visualizing and cross-checking POSSUM calculations.