Post-surgical infection in elective cardiac surgeries: what is the role of dental evaluation? A retrospective study.

Authors

Ana Eliza Durães de Faria, Itamara Lúcia Itagiba Neves, Ricardo Simões Neves, Samara Caroline Fernandes Galvani, Henrique Furukawa, Bianca de Fatima Borim Pulino, Heloisa Fonseca Marão, Raphael Capelli Guerra, Marcela Alves Dos Santos-Paul

Published in

Einstein (Sao Paulo, Brazil). Volume 24. Issue spe3. Pages eAO2495. Epub Aug 17, 2026.

Abstract

To evaluate the prevalence and clinical characteristics of post-surgical infections after coronary and/or valvular heart surgery at a tertiary hospital and to examine the relationship between these infections and prior dental evaluation.
A retrospective study was conducted among patients who underwent elective cardiac surgery at InCor-HCFMUSP between January 2018 and April 2019.
The sample included 1,276 surgeries, of which 10.6% were associated with post-surgical infection. Length of hospital stay and infection-related mortality differed significantly between patients with and without post-surgical infection (p<0.0001). Surgical site infections were the most prevalent infections, accounting for 6.2% of the sample, whereas pneumonia was the least frequent, accounting for 0.2%. Dental evaluation was performed in 62.3% of patients in the Valve Surgery Group and 25.8% of those in the Coronary Surgery Group. Among patients who underwent dental evaluation, 89.8% did not develop infection; dental evaluation was also significantly associated with length of hospital stay in the Valve and Coronary Surgery Groups (p=0.0187 and p=0.0317, respectively).
Post-surgical infection occurred in 10.6% of surgeries. Prior dental evaluation was not significantly associated with post-surgical infection, although a favorable percentage trend was observed among evaluated patients. Poor oral health is a risk factor for certain infections; however, these infections were not frequent in this sample. Hospital stay was shorter among patients who underwent dental evaluation.

PMID:
42659438
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 28 Aug 2026.

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