European Census on Pediatric Surgery.

BACKGROUND

Detailed data on the distribution of pediatric surgical institutions in Europe are sparse. Therefore, the Section and Board of Pediatric Surgery of the Union of European Medical Specialists (UEMS) and the European Pediatric Surgeons' Association (EUPSA) jointly organized the first official census of the European centers of pediatric surgery (PS).

MATERIALS AND METHODS

After obtaining a list of pediatric surgical centers in Europe, a specialized questionnaire was created and made available on the Internet. General, workload, staff, and ancillary data were collected for the centers.

RESULTS

Total 215 out of 431 centers answered. PS center density is 1 in every 177,000 children or 1 in every 1,142,000 inhabitants. Approximately 77% of the centers (167 out of 215) are training centers in PS. Every center has an average inpatients procedures/year equal to 1,588, and 92.6 neonatal procedures/year. There are 3.9 surgeons/100,000 children, and 1,662 neonates for every surgeon. In average every EU surgeon performs 202 procedures/year, of which 11 procedures are on neonates. Trainees represent the 38% of the total workforce, and there are 2.3 trainees for every staff aged > 60 years.

CONCLUSION

The paper aims to offer a more grounded basis on which the future of PS in our Continent should be planned. Presented data will provide an invaluable help to all our colleagues, as well as national policy makers, to press for and to make better informed and well-grounded sound political choices in the field of PS.