National Emergency Laparotomy Audit (NELA)

Programme overview

Over 30,000 patients each year undergo emergency laparotomy with estimated costs to the NHS in the region of £650 million in England alone. This audit of a high mortality (c 15%) emergency surgery specifically seeks to improve the key determinants of outcome which are all underpinned by professional standards such as those detailed by NCEPOD, the Department of Health and Royal College of Surgeons. It focusses on systematic pre-op prioritisation based on formal risk assessment, pre-op imaging and antibiotics, timely access to theatre and critical care and appropriate input from consultant surgeons and anaesthetists.

NELA has created three very useful animations. Please see the links below to access the videos:

Using run charts

Improving data feedback

Understanding the system

Additional information on all HQIP-commissioned projects is available on the NHS Trusts page, which includes the recommendations repository, infographics compendium, 9 month publication schedule, impact report, and National Clinical Audit and Enquiries Directory. For further information about this project, please contact the project team directly using the contact details listed in the ‘Supplier Info’ section above.

Accessing data

Data collected on behalf of HQIP by all NCAPOP projects is routinely reported and these reports are available in the ‘Related resources’ section.

For regularly updated dynamic reporting of audit data, follow the link in the HQIP Directory in the column called ‘Link to dynamic reporting’.

The reported data is also placed on the data.gov.uk website.

For details of how to apply for data that is not in the public domain, please see HQIP’s data access webpages.

Details of the contracts that HQIP awards are available at: www.gov.uk/contracts-finder.