Establishment and Validation of an Intraoperative Hypothermia Risk Prediction Model in Patients Undergoing Posterior Cervical Surgery Under General Anaesthesia: A Two‐Centre, Retrospective Observational Study

Background Maintaining normal body temperature during operation is significant for the prognosis of surgical patients. The purpose of this study was to investigate the risk factors of hypothermia during posterior cervical surgery and establish a risk prediction model to facilitate the surgical team to identify high‐risk patients before surgery. Aim The aim of this study was to establish and validate a predictive model for assessing intraoperative hypothermia risk in patients undergoing posterior cervical surgery under general anaesthesia. Design Retrospective cohort study. Methods This was a retrospective, two‐centre, observational study conducted in the anaesthesia surgery departments of two tertiary Grade A hospitals. Patients who underwent posterior cervical surgery between January 1, 2018 and June 30, 2024 were included in our study. Based on the literature and working experience, the patient factors and surgical factors related to intraoperative hypothermia were selected. The predictive model of intraoperative hypothermia was constructed by pairings comparison, LASSO, logistic regression. The performance of the model was evaluated by correction curve, consistency index (C‐index) and decision curve. Results The incidence of intraoperative hypothermia in 818 patients in the modelling group was 32.8%. Of the initial 17 potential predictors, three variables were incorporated into the final predictive model: preoperative body temperature, preoperative serum albumin value, and preoperative white blood cell count. The C‐index of the prediction model was 0.858 (95% CI: 0.827–0.887), the patient benefit rate was 0.08–0.83, and the C‐index of the validation group was 0.824. Conclusion This study found that this prediction model can accurately predict the risk of intraoperative hypothermia in patients undergoing posterior cervical surgery and can therefore be used to improve patient safety intraoperatively.