Preoperative electrocardiography for predicting cardiovascular events after noncardiac surgery: a secondary analysis of two prospective cohorts

The authors aimed to determine whether preoperative resting electrocardiograms (ECGs), including conventional features and deep-learning analysis via the PreOpNet algorithm, could enhance the prediction of cardiovascular events following noncardiac surgery beyond established clinical risk scores. Their analysis of two prospective cohorts revealed that while incorporating ECG findings did provide some improvement in predictive performance, the overall incremental value for assessing cardiovascular risk was limited. Thus, preoperative ECG assessments may not significantly enhance risk stratification in this context.