Current Status and Future Prospects of Acute Care Surgery in Japan

Abstract

Acute Care Surgery (ACS) is a new surgical specialty that combines trauma surgery, endogenous emergency surgery, and surgical intensive care in a three-pronged approach. In recent years, surgical rescue, which consists of management of critically ill patients with postoperative complications, has been added as the fourth pillar of ACS. The role of ACS in surgical care has expanded in Europe and the United States. In Japan, the ACS Study Group was established in 2009 and has since developed into an academic society. ACS is gradually gaining recognition as a field of surgery. Furthermore, the ACS Certified Surgeon System was established to train surgeons who were capable of initial treatment, decision making, surgical procedures, and systemic management of ACS, and is expected to improve the standard of ACS care in Japan. On the other hand, ACS faces many challenges in Japan, such as proper training of ACS surgeons in trauma-intensive and surgical emergency facilities with different institutional backgrounds. The establishment of the ideal Japanese ACS through collaboration with multiple surgical subspecialties and inter-institutional cooperation is underway.