An Italian Survey on the Prophylaxis of Venous Thromboembolism

Objective:To determine the current usage of prophylactic regimes to prevent deep vein thrombosis in surgical departments in Italy.Design:Survey by questionnaire sent to 500 surgical departments.Participants:Surgical departments performing more than 500 surgical operations, selected randomly by the process of quota sampling.Main outcome measures:Assessment of the methods or prophylaxis, reasons for use of prophylaxis and assessment of outcome of prophylactic measures.Results:There were 326 completed questionnaires returned indicating that prophylaxis was used routinely in 58% of the centres, 29% of centres used more than 1 method of prophylaxis with subcutaneous heparin and elastic compression being the most commonly used modalities.Conclusion:Insufficient use of prophylactic measures to prevent deep vein thrombosis in Italy still leads to an excessive number of postoperative venous thromboses.