Patients requiring temporary abdominal closure have a significant in-hospital mortality rate of 33%. Delayed primary closure with vacuum assistance was achieved for 71.9% of the surviving patients. Maintaining a negative or total positive fluid balance of less than 20 L before the last attempted fascial closure improves successful closure rates, as seen in 19 of 22 patients (86.4%). The vacuum-assisted closure technique also enabled successful primary closure for two patients with extreme delay (>8 days). Elevated serum lactate levels are significantly correlated with early and in-hospital mortality. A significant decrease in lactate level during the first 12 hours is associated with achievement of primary closure.

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Enoxaparin regimens commonly used for prophylaxis fail to achieve optimal anti-factor Xa levels in up to 70 per cent of trauma patients. Accordingly, trauma services at the study institution endeavored to develop a standardized approach to optimize pharmacologic prevention with enoxaparin. An enoxaparin venous thromboembolism (VTE) prophylaxis protocol implemented in October 2015 provided weight-adjusted initial dosing parameters with subsequent dose titration to achieve targeted anti-factor Xa levels. Symptomatic VTE rate was evaluated 12 months pre- and post-implementation. Data were obtained from the trauma registry and charts were reviewed from electronic medical records. The rate of symptomatic VTE significantly declined post-implementation (2.0% vs 0.9%, P = 0.009). Enoxaparin use was comparable in these two phases validating that the decline in symptomatic VTEs was not due to an increase in enoxaparin use. Symptomatic VTE rate for patients who received enoxaparin in the post-implementation cohort decreased from 3.2 to 1.0 per cent (P = 0.023, 95% confidence interval = 0.124–0.856). There was also a significant decrease in the rate of symptomatic deep vein thrombosis (2.8% vs 0.9%, P = 0.040, 95% confidence interval = 0.117–0.950). This approach to VTE prophylaxis with enoxaparin resulted in a significant reduction in symptomatic VTE rates. Implementation of similar practices may be equally impactful in other institutions that use enoxaparin.