OBJECTIVES: Identify, based on data from the Brazilian National Health System (SUS), obtained from the SUS data base system (DATASUS), good practices in cardiac surgeries in the state of São Paulo in 36 months, to construct and evaluate decision-making performance indicators.

METHODS: An overview of all cardiovascular surgery procedures from July 2013 to July 2016, was carried out in order to identify Institution who underwent cardiologic surgical interventions and procedures held during this period. The physicians who participated in the same surgery were not identified but grouped as "team". The data were consolidated by teams and then submitted to the calculation of the indicators. As a result, the following indicators were created: volume of hospitalization and re-hospitalization, quantity and percentage of Administrative Death (up to 30 days after the procedure) and Operational (in the procedure), death in 6 months, average hospital and intensive care unit stays.

RESULTS: One of the major challenges of health economics today is how to identify and evaluate resource consumption variables. By demonstrating the results by indicators, it was possible to present a vision for decision making by team managers and / or paying sources, showing which team has the highest positive index, for example, procedures performed with a lower death rate and without high readmission rates. Overall, the search resulted in the identification of 6,068 teams, which treated 45,563 patients, generating a total of 48,945 hospitalizations.

CONCLUSIONS: The evaluation of the cardiac surgery teams performance might be a tool to improve the results and the quality of the assistance provided. Knowing and disseminating the results may have a positive impact, since it would allow the elaboration of strategies for improvement with the involvement of the surgical team and the managers.