Table 1.

Risk for Persistent Postoperative Pain (PPP) after Various Types of Surgery with Estimated Surgical Volumes

Type of Surgery	Risk of PPP*	Risk of Severe PPP*	Surgical Volume† (cases/year in the US in 2003)
Amputation	40%	10%	~130,000
Breast surgery	25%	10%	~110,000
Thoracotomy	40%	10%	~70,000
Hernia repair	10%	4%	~250,000
Cesarean section	10%	4%	~1,200,000

Even though the risk may seem low for some interventions, the sheer volume (roughly estimated for the United States) still leads to a significant number of previously healthy patients ending up with severe, disabling pain after surgery.

^*Risk values adapted from Kehlet et al.

^†Number of surgical cases adapted from Merrill and Elixhauser.⁹