Procedures are classified into 185 surgically relevant groups, related to specific organs (heart, lung, kidney, etc.), the type of intervention (incision, anastomosis, etc.), and the access (direct, endoscopic, surgical with or without vital organ assistance).

Procedures codes are defined as follows. The first three letters indicate the operated organ, generally based on its Latin root:
BRA (lat. brachial): arm
CRU (lat. crural): thigh
CER (lat. cerebral): brain
etc.

The fourth character refers to the level of invasiveness of the intervention (from 0 to 5). Level 1 means procedures without breaking of skin or mucous membrane (e.g. endoscopy, angiography). Level 2 represents endoscopic or minor surgical interventions. Level 2 are endoscopic or minor surgical interventions. Then, the level of invasiveness increases from 3 to 6, with 6 describing the most invasive procedures.

All procedures are classified according to the degree of hospitalization requirement:
– yes (hospital stay)
– one day (day surgery unit)
– no (outpatient treatment)

and the necessity to have an intensive care unit at proximity if the patient’s health state degrades quickly (yes/no).

The exhaustive list of SQLape®’s procedures groups can be dowloaded in either .xls, .pdf, or .txt format.