Vasculator: Development of a vascular surgery risk assessment toolbox

Complications from vascular surgery are major contributors to inpatient hospital morbidity and mortality. Three of the most prevalent complications include aortic graft infections, groin surgical site infections, and aortic dissection. It is often difficult to stratify risk when assessing complications. Also, with new literature being published, staying up to date on guidelines and standards of care can prove challenging. As such, the field of vascular surgery is primed to adopt technology-driven medical solutions. As modern medicine has integrated these solutions, the computational models have advanced from basic calculators, to formularies and, now, risk management algorithms. In the present study, the use of algorithms to stratify risk is integrated into a vascular risk assessment toolbox known as Vasculator (available at: Vasculator.net). With this toolbox, surgeons are able to determine the appropriate guideline for diagnosing aortic graft infection via the VascuMAGIC algorithm, the risk of groin surgical site infection from risk factors using the Vasculink algorithm, and dissection acuity using the VascuDissection algorithm. This work describes the development of the three risk assessment algorithms, integration of the algorithms into a toolbox, and how to use the toolbox with example cases.