Introduction : Quality in hospital health services depend on multiple factors. therefore, each process related to the accomplishment of care should be an indicator of the attention level. Surgery call-offs is one of the indicators revealing difficulties which health settings might be having. Objective : The objective of this study was to identify, from the perspective of health professionals, those factors which yield to surgery call-offs in a highly complex hospital. Methods : The study design was basic and descriptive with a sample of 30 subjects: 15 nurses and 15 doctors, from which 2 nurses and 3 doctors ultimately decided not to participate. The researchers gathered the data through a questionnaire with open and close questions, having as a reference the "Safe Surgery" check list. These data were analyzed using the EPI-INFOTM version 18 software. Results : The most relevant findings were: 44% of the surgery call-offs motives were considered administrative, while 28% were attributed to assistance causes. Conclusion : As a conclusion, it was identified that health professionals perceive a low grade administration management to accomplish all the surgical procedures which should be performed, thus, negatively affecting the patients and their families, and generating impacts on the institutional costs.