Healthy subjects' knowledge of surgical complications: a hospital-based survey.

BACKGROUND/AIM There is an ongoing debate about how much a patient should know about serious or frequently occurring risks of their surgery. In this study, we evaluated healthy subjects' perspectives on knowledge of serious surgical complications. MATERIALS AND METHODS Three hundred and thirty healthy subjects (151 women, 179 men; mean age: 43.6 ± 17.3 years) were surveyed with the study questionnaire. Social profile, surgical history of the healthy subjects, and presence of a relative while giving preoperative consent were assessed. RESULTS Only 23.5% (39/166) of the subjects were informed about all the potential complications of their previous surgical operation and 44.9% (73/166) did not get any preoperative consent on surgical complications. A statistically significant percentage of subjects who did not get proper information about the serious complications involved in their surgery indicated a desire for preoperative informed consent (97.0%, 128/132, P = 0.0001). CONCLUSION The results indicated that a significant percentage of the subjects wanted to be informed of the potential complications of a surgery in the presence of a relative (73.9%, 192/260, P = 0.009). Involving a relative in preoperative consent may have a positive effect on the patient and can increase the level of postoperative recall of the risks.