Aldrete's scoring system

Aldrete's scoring system is a commonly used scale for determining when postsurgical patients can be safely discharged from the post-anesthesia care unit, generally to a second stage recovery area, hospital ward, or home. It was devised in 1970 by, a Mexican anesthesiologist, while working at the Denver Veterans Affairs Hospital.

Scoring system

The original scoring system was developed before the invention of pulse oximetry and used the patient's colouration as a surrogate marker of their oxygenation status. A modified Aldrete scoring system was described in 1995 which replaces the assessment of skin colouration with the use of pulse oximetry to measure SpO₂.

Alternatives

The following criteria also exist:

White in 1999 proposed "fast-track criteria" to determine if patients can be transferred straight from theatre to Phase II recovery. He proposes a minimum overall score of 12 with no score <1 in any category. He includes consciousness, activity, circulation, respiration, oxygen saturations, pain and emesis. This does not include bleeding or urine output. This was used by Song et al. 2004.
Post anaesthetic discharge scoring system used by Chung et al. 1995.
Discharge criteria tool used by Brown et al. 2008.
DASAIM discharge assessment tool used by Gartner et al. 2010.