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Article History

Received: 13 December 2021

Accepted: 16 September 2022

First Online: 3 November 2022

Declarations

:

: Ethical approval for this study was granted by the Research Ethics Committee of the Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland (REC201910019). We confirm that all methods in this study were carried out in accordance with their specifications and other relevant guidelines and regulations. The ethics committee recognized that explicit consent to participate in the study was not required, as the data used in this study were retrospective, routinely collected, and anonymised. The data controller, the Healthcare Pricing Office, responsible for holding and managing the national Hospital In-Patient Enquiry (HIPE) database, granted access and permission to use the data in this study. The Healthcare Pricing Office ensured strict data user agreements were followed, and the data were anonymized by limiting certain combinations of data that could lead to patient identification. This was in line with the Healthcare Pricing Office adherence to The Data Protection Acts 1998 to 2018 and Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and the council of 27 of 27 April 2016 also known as the General Data Protection Regulation or GDPR (HPO Data Protection Statement Version 1.2, May 2020, Healthcare Pricing Office. [available at: ExternalRef removed ]

: Not applicable.

: The authors declare that they have no competing interests.