Maastricht UMC testing if patients can sleep at home night before surgery

Maastricht University Medical Center has begun a pilot program that allows patients to sleep at home the night before major planned operations, rather than checking in the evening prior, aiming to reduce anxiety and generate significant cost savings.

The initial results are positive, regional broadcaster L1 reported. The initiative is part of the hospital’s broader “Lopend naar de OK” (Walking to the OR) project, which also encourages patients to walk to the operating room on their own rather than being transported in a bed.

The changes are reportedly producing substantial savings. A single-day admission costs an average of 800 to 1,000 euros. Maastricht UMC, which runs multiple operations daily across 20 operating rooms, is saving at least 320,000 euros per month by eliminating pre-surgery overnight stays.

Colon cancer surgeon Tim Lubbers said patients often feel tense before surgery. “You lie in a strange room, often also with other patients whom you don’t know,” he told L1.

The hospital has already made sleeping at home standard practice for colon cancer operations and is now studying whether the approach can be expanded to other procedures.

“Overnight stays in the hospital are actually a standard procedure that we have never consciously thought about,” Lubbers said. Patients who want to can still choose to be admitted the evening before, the hospital emphasized.