Background: Previous studies have examined the impact of resiliency on postoperative outcomes in other orthopedic domains, but none to date have done so for hand surgery.
Methods: We performed a retrospective analysis of prospectively collected data of patients undergoing hand surgery at a single institution. We included patients with complete preoperative outcomes scores and 6-month follow-up. All patients completed the Brief Resilience Scale (BRS), Disabilities of the Arm, Shoulder, and Hand (DASH) Score, Quick Disabilities of the Arm, Shoulder, and Hand (QuickDASH), Veterans RAND 12-Item Health Survey (VR-12), and Numeric Rating Scale (NRS) for pain. Patients were stratified into high-resiliency (HR) and low-resiliency (LR) groups based on the preoperative BRS score, and outcomes between groups were compared.
Results: We identified 91 patients who underwent hand procedures and completed full preoperative and postoperative outcomes measures. There were no observed preoperative differences between the groups in all outcomes scores except the VR-12 Mental Component Score. Postoperatively, the HR group had superior DASH, QuickDASH, and VR-12 (mental and physical component) scores than the LR group. Postoperative pain, as measured by the NRS, was significantly lower in the HR group despite there being no preoperative difference. A larger percentage of patients in the HR group met the minimal clinically important difference in all outcomes except for the VR-12 Mental Component Scores.
Conclusions: Patients with high preoperative resilience appear to have significantly better clinical outcomes following hand surgery with superior DASH, QuickDASH, and VR-12 scores at 6-month follow-up.
Type of study/level of evidence: Prognostic study/Level IV evidence.
Keywords: hand surgery; minimal clinically important difference; patient-reported outcomes; psychosocial; resilience.