More than 200 million adults have noncardiac surgery worldwide every year. Anesthesia closed claims databases allow anesthesia providers to critically examine adverse outcomes that occur during an anesthetic or immediately following the administration of anesthesia, to aid in improving patient care. A qualitative analysis of 34 closed malpractice claims with a cardiac-related event was conducted to determine common themes. Five common themes emerged: preanesthetic evaluation, normalization of deviance, medications, hemorrhage, and knowledge deficit/failed clinical reasoning.