Why participate in the STS National Database?

  • Improve patient outcomes
  • Identify best practices, potential gaps, and new areas for quality improvement
  • Evaluate your hospital's performance against national and regional competitors
  • Document your practice's quality of care delivery
  • Engage in risk modeling of major procedures
  • Access data for assessment of new technology and techniques
  • Publicly report your outcomes so that consumers can see how participating surgical groups compare with national benchmarks for overall performance, survival, complications, and other measures
  • Meet the American Board of Thoracic Surgery Maintenance of Certification Part IV – Evaluation of Performance in Practice

International institutions are encouraged to participate. Learn more about the benefits of international participation.

How to Participate

Step 1: Contact Derek Steck to receive the Participant Contact Form, Participation Agreement, and Business Associates/Data Use Agreement. On the Participant Contact Form, please include contact information for the following people. You must provide surgeon-specific emails for all participating surgeons.

  • All surgeons/anesthesiologists participating
  • Surgeon Representative
  • Anesthesiologist Representative (if applicable)
  • Primary (and Backup) Data and File Contacts
  • Data Quality Report Recipient
  • Contract Contact
  • National Report Recipient

Step 2: Identify an STS Certified/Harvest Compliant Software Vendor.

Step 3: Fill out the form/agreements and return to Derek Steck. Once the agreements are fully executed, a five-digit Participant ID # (PID) will be issued.

Database Participation Fees
Database Component Participation Fees Additional Fees
Adult Cardiac Surgery Database $6,500 if a majority of participating surgeons are STS members

$9,750 if ≤ half of participating surgeons are STS members

 $2,000 for each additional hospital NPI if participants have more than one hospital 

$4,000 Optional anesthesia component

$3,000 One-time onboarding fee for new non-US and Canada participants
General Thoracic Surgery Database $650 per participating STS member surgeon

$1,150 per participating non-STS member surgeon

 $3,000 One-time onboarding fee for new non-US and Canada participants
Congenital Heart Surgery Database $9,000 if a majority of participating surgeons are STS members

$13,500 if ≤ half of participating surgeons are STS members

$2,000 for each additional hospital NPI if participants have more than one hospital 

$5,000 Optional anesthesia component

$3,000 One-time onboarding fee for new non-US and Canada participants
Intermacs $15,000 flat fee $3,000 One-time onboarding fee for new non-US and Canada participants
Pedimacs $5,500 flat fee $3,000 One-time onboarding fee for new non-US and Canada participants