TY - CHAP M1 - Book, Section TI - Preoperative Testing A1 - Cohn, Steven L. A1 - Smetana, Gerald W. A2 - Cohn, Steven L. PY - 2021 T2 - Decision Making in Perioperative Medicine: Clinical Pearls AB - Preoperative evaluation of apparently healthy patients is a common activity for internists and other medical specialists. In general, the most important test is a careful medical history to seek elements which may increase perioperative risk above baseline. Individual laboratory and other tests should be ordered selectively based on patient and procedure-related characteristics, and in general, should not be done routinely without a clinical indication. Despite decades of evidence arguing against routine testing, medical culture is such that some of this testing persists. General rationales for ordering preoperative tests are to identify patients at higher risk for particular postoperative complications, to guide anesthetic management, to predict which patients require particular monitoring after surgery, and for medicolegal reasons. In fact, in most instances, testing for any of these indications rarely achieves the desired goals. In this chapter, we discuss the recommended selective indications for testing. SN - PB - McGraw Hill CY - New York, NY Y2 - 2024/03/28 UR - accessmedicine.mhmedical.com/content.aspx?aid=1179530400 ER -