Paediatric tonsillectomy in England: A cohort study of clinical practice and outcomes using Hospital Episode Statistics data (2008‐2019)

Abstract

Clinical practice of paediatric tonsillectomy has changed in England over the past 11 years. The overall mortality rate associated with the procedure is 0.0037%. Differences in outcomes have been identified for different procedural methods. However, routine administrative data are limited in differentiating procedural detail (eg we are unable to differentiate intra or extra-capsular techniques from current clinical coding of tonsillectomy procedures). Therefore, prospective national data collection or more granular clinical coding is essential to capture relative outcomes of the different tonsillectomy methods and techniques being used in the NHS.