The effects of resident participation on patient morbidity and mortality in major gastrointestinal oncologic surgery.

437Background: While the effects of resident participation have been documented in various studies, there has yet to be a comprehensive study analyzing resident participation in overall gastrointestinal (GI) oncologic surgery. The aim of this study was to compare outcomes in major GI oncologic cases performed by an attending alone and those performed by an attending and resident. Methods: The ACS-NSQIP database from 2005-12 was utilized to study major (GI) operations (esophagectomy, gastrectomy, pancreatectomy, enterectomy, hepatectomy, and colectomy/proctectomy) in patients with an ICD-9 cancer diagnosis. Major complications and 30-day mortality were then compared in those patients who underwent surgery with an attending alone (AA) to those patients who underwent surgery with an attending and resident (AR). Results: A total of 64,637 patients met criteria for the study; AR n = 48,022 and AA n = 16,615. In 76.6% of AR cases, the resident assistance was classified as senior level PGY-4 or higher. On averag...