Introduction:

postoperative nausea and vomiting rank as the worst patient experience along with pain and intraoperative awakening.

Objective:

to determine the incidence of postoperative nausea and vomiting in patients who receive general anesthesia for elective surgery.

Methods:

an observational, descriptive, cross-sectional study was carried out in 2 334 patients belonging to “Arnaldo Milián Castro” Clinical and Surgical University Hospital and “Dr. Celestino Hernández Robau” University Hospital from Santa Clara between January 2013 and December 2018. Gender, age, smoking, history of motion sickness, postoperative nausea and vomiting, anesthetic and halogenated agents used, use of perioperative opioids, type of surgical intervention according to hospital stay and treatment at the surgical site, surgical time and appearance of nausea and vomiting in the first 24 hours after surgery were the variables studied.

Results:

the incidence of postoperative nausea and vomiting was 15.9%, with a predominance in female patients under 50 years of age, non-smokers, those with a history of postoperative nausea and vomiting or motion sickness, in which halogenated agents and postoperative opioids were used, in non-ambulatory surgery and conventional approach, and in patients with surgical times equal to or greater than one hour.

Conclusions:

the incidence of postoperative nausea and vomiting was low and a probability of postoperative nausea and vomiting was established from no factor to 7 risk factors with percentage values: 5.5%, 6.9%, 13.3%, 29.7%, 40%, 50%, 60% and 71.4%, respectively.