Comparative analysis of postoperative complications and outcomes in outpatient versus inpatient orthognathic surgery: A retrospective cohort study

The purpose of this study was to assess and compare the complication rates of single-jaw orthognathic surgery between outpatients and inpatients, and to examine their impact on the outcome of care setting. A retrospective cohort study was performed of patients who underwent single-jaw orthognathic procedures. Outpatients between 2008 and 2023 were selected as the study group, while inpatients between 1997 and 2023 were enrolled as the control group. The predictor variable was the patient care setting. The primary outcome variable was the occurrence of overall complications. Secondary outcomes included surgery-, anesthesia-, and patient-related complications. Other study variables included age, sex, surgery, and anesthetic procedures. Descriptive, bivariate, and multiple logistic regression statistics were computed and the significance level was set at p ≤ 0.05. The sample included 307 patients with a mean age of 23.1 years ±9.5 years, of whom 55% were female. The outpatient and inpatient groups consisted of 123 (40.1%) and 184 (59.9%) patients, respectively. Of the 123 outpatients, 104 (85.5%) were discharged on the day of surgery. Age (p = 0.012) and ketamine administration (p = 0.022) were significantly associated with complications among outpatients. Outpatient setting and age were significantly associated with overall complications (OR 2.48; 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.34-4.66, p = 0.003 and OR 0.94, 95% CI 0.88-0.98, p = 0.021, respectively) and anesthetic-related complications (OR 4.43, 95% CI 2.03-10.5, p = 0.0003 and OR 0.92, 95% CI 0.83-0.98, p = 0.041, respectively). The study demonstrated that outpatient orthognathic surgery had a high success rate but also identified a higher rate of anesthetic-related complications among outpatients, particularly in younger patients and in those receiving ketamine.