The Society of Thoracic Surgeons Adult Cardiac Surgery Database: 2016 Update on Research.

The Society of Thoracic Surgeons Adult Cardiac Database (ACSD) is an international voluntary effort that is the foundation of our specialty's efforts in clinical performance assessment and quality improvement. Containing nearly 6,000,000 patient records, the ACSD is a robust resource for clinical research. Seven major original publications and four review articles were generated from the ACSD in 2015. The risk-adjusted outcome analyses and quality measures reported in these studies have made substantial contributions to inform daily clinical practice. This report summarizes the ACSD-based research efforts published in 2015.