ABSTRACT
The results of fluid therapy can be evaluated in many ways. The most common one is to study how much blood volume has become expanded or, otherwise, how the fluid improves a compromised cardiovascular status. It is less common to report an effect on the result of the entire surgical treatment (outcome). One reason for the relatively few such studies made is that the success of surgical treatment is multifactorial. To overcome the other factors, a large number of patients need to be included. Nevertheless, such studies have been conducted. They have often been in the form of a meta-analysis, which means that a reviewer has scanned the literature and put together results from different studies that meet certain predetermined criteria. The purpose of doing so is to find results that have not been apparent in the separate studies due to their small size.
