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ASA Physical Status Classification

Preoperative classification of a patient's overall physical/systemic health.

ASA Physical Status Classification
ASA class
Emergency surgery
ResultASA I

Descriptive classification of baseline physical status; not itself a numeric risk score but correlates with perioperative morbidity and mortality.

When to use

  • Documenting preoperative physical status as part of anaesthetic risk assessment and case communication.

Formula

Ordinal classification I-VI assigned by clinical judgement of systemic disease burden; an 'E' suffix denotes an emergency procedure.

Pearls and pitfalls

  • Not designed to predict individual perioperative risk precisely - inter-rater variability is well described.
  • Should be combined with procedure-specific and functional-status information for overall risk assessment.

References

  1. American Society of Anesthesiologists. ASA Physical Status Classification System (originally Saklad M. Anesthesiology. 1941;2:281-4).