Outpatient surgery and sequelae: an analysis of the AAAASF Internet-based quality assurance and peer review database.

Although Internet-based quality assurance and peer review data have demonstrated the safety of procedures performed in the outpatient setting through the analysis of outcomes, the future of patient care will be directed by evidence-based medicine. Large inpatient surgical databases have long existed to provide quality assurance and improvement data for the inpatient cohort of patients. The acquisition of large data sets related to surgical care can best be achieved through the Internet. When outcomes are analyzed in conjunction with the indications for a procedure and the manner that care was delivered, evidence-based medicine is the end product.