Protocol for the derivation and external validation of a 30-day mortality risk prediction model for older patients having emergency general surgery (PAUSE score-Probability of mortality Associated with Urgent/emergent general Surgery in oldEr patients score).

Ethics for NSQIP data use was obtained from the Ottawa Hospital Research Ethics Board; external validation will use routinely collected anonymised data legally exempt from research ethics review. The final risk score will be published in a peer-reviewed journal. We plan to further disseminate the model as an online calculator or application for clinical use. Future research will be required to test the clinical application of the final model.