Granell Gil M, García Aguado R, Tommasi Rosso M, López Alarcón M D, Aguar Olba F, Cantó Armengod A, Palanca Sanfrancisco J M, Grau Real F
Servicio de Anestesiología, Hospital General Universitario de Valencia.
Rev Esp Anestesiol Reanim. 1998 Nov;45(9):384-8.
To evaluate the efficacy and incidence of side effects of two types of lumbar epidural analgesia with morphine, preemptive or postincisional, combined with total intravenous anesthesia in chest surgery.
This double-blind prospective study enrolled 20 patients (ASA I-IV) undergoing lobectomy or pneumonectomy. Anesthetic induction and maintenance was provided with propofol, atracurium and alfentanil. Lumbar epidural analgesia (L2-L3) with morphine was provided for group A patients with 2 to 4 mg upon excision of tissue and for group B with 2 to 4 mg during anesthetic induction. The following variables were recorded: arterial blood gas concentrations, heart rate, SpO2, EtCO2, postanesthetic recovery, arterial gases, side effects and pain on a visual analogue scale. Top-up analgesia was provided by intravenous metamizole and/or epidural morphine. For statistical analysis we used ANOVA, chi-square tests and Student-Newman-Keuls tests.
The need for propofol and alfentanil during anesthesia, and for morphine and metamizole after surgery were statistically greater in group A. Pain 18 hours after surgery was also greater in group A. No significant differences between groups for other variables was observed.
Preemptive analgesia with lumbar epidural morphine in addition to the general anesthesia described here seems to provide higher-quality analgesia with few side effects, reducing the need for propofol and alfentanil during surgery and for postoperative morphine and metamizole.
