ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Thoracic epidural anesthesia (TEA) is widely used for major surgery, but studies assessing its impact on left ventricular (LV) systolic and diastolic function are limited, and such studies have assessed patients already under general anesthesia and/or receiving volume expansion between examinations. METHODS: Observational study at a secondary university hospital including consecutive awake patients undergoing major abdominal surgery without significant pre-existing cardiac disease. Patients received a pre-emptive intravenous volume loading before epidural catheter placement with puncture between T6-T7 and T8-T9. Hemodynamic and trans-thoracic echocardiography (TTE) parameters were assessed before and after establishing TEA with a 10 mL bolus of 2% lidocaine. Changes in heart rate (HR), mean arterial pressure (MAP), stroke volume (SV), cardiac output (CO), LV systolic function (as evaluated by fractional shortening [FS]; ejection fraction [EF]; Simpson; S prime [S`]), and LV diastolic function were recorded. RESULTS: Twenty-four awake patients were included. After TEA, HR, MAP, SV and CO significantly decreased (15.0%, 29.3%, 6.8% and 22%, respectively; all P<0.01); LV systolic function was also reduced by TEA (FS by 28%, EF-Simpson by 26%, S' by 15.3%, all P<0.001). TEA non-significantly reduced the incidence of diastolic dysfunction, from 65% (N.=15/23) to 43% (N.=10/23) patients (P=0.13) in the 23 complete diastolic function evaluations. CONCLUSIONS: The net effect of TEA in awake patients is a reduction of HR and LV systolic function, which results in a reduction of the CO and the MAP. The effect of TEA on LV diastolic function remains to be addressed by larger studies.
Subject(s)
Anesthesia, Epidural/methods , Echocardiography , Ventricular Function, Left , Adult , Aged , Aged, 80 and over , Arterial Pressure , Cardiac Output , Female , Heart Rate , Humans , Male , Middle Aged , Systole , Thoracic VertebraeABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE: To compare the incidence of diplopia after topical or regional injection anesthesia in cataract surgery. STUDY DESIGN: Retrospective, noncomparative interventional case series. PARTICIPANTS AND METHODS: Three thousand five hundred forty-two consecutive cataract surgeries, performed from March 1998 to December 2001, were studied. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Incidence and mechanisms of diplopia. RESULTS: Two thousand one hundred twenty-two patients were operated under regional and 1420 under topical anesthesia. Twenty-four cases of diplopia were observed, 21 (87.5%) in the regional group and 3 (12.5%) after topical anesthesia (P = 0.005). Eleven cases (45.8%) were secondary to motility problems, all in the regional anesthesia group (P = 0.006). Eight cases (33.3%) were secondary to refractive errors or intraocular lens luxation, 5 after regional and 3 after topical anesthesia (P = 0.88). Five cases (20.8%) were secondary to fusion loss, all in the regional anesthesia group (P = 0.06). CONCLUSIONS: In our study, topical anesthesia was associated with a lower incidence of diplopia relative to regional injection anesthesia. No cases of diplopia secondary to fusion loss or muscle damage were found after topical anesthesia surgery.
Subject(s)
Anesthesia, Local/methods , Cataract Extraction , Diplopia/epidemiology , Postoperative Complications/epidemiology , Administration, Topical , Aged , Aged, 80 and over , Anesthetics, Local/administration & dosage , Female , Humans , Incidence , Male , Middle Aged , Retrospective StudiesABSTRACT
UNLABELLED: We designed this study to ascertain whether, for the purpose of clinical interpretation, the direct measurement of O(2) consumption with the PhysioFlex closed-circuit anesthesia machine and with the Deltatrac II indirect calorimeter are interchangeable. Oxygen consumption was measured using the two instruments successively in critically-ill, mechanically-ventilated patients. Measurements were recorded as the mean of 10 consecutive, minute-by-minute, stable readings. The degree of agreement between the measurements obtained with the two systems was estimated using Bland-Altman analysis and the intraclass correlation coefficient. Forty-four pairs of measurements made in 21 patients were analyzed, yielding a mean bias of 6.32 mL/min and limits of agreement of 40.28 and -27.63 mL/min. The intraclass correlation coefficient was 0.95, and the 95% confidence interval ranged from 0.91 to 0.97. The measurement of O(2) consumption obtained with the PhysioFlex anesthesia machine is interchangeable with that obtained by indirect calorimetry. IMPLICATIONS: The PhysioFlex anesthesia machine (Dräger Inc., Lübeck, Germany) is a closed circuit anesthesia delivery device. The oxygen delivered by this device to maintain a steady-state inspired oxygen concentration is therefore a measure of the patient's oxygen consumption. This study was designed to evaluate the accuracy of the PhysioFlex for measuring oxygen consumption by comparing it with an established technology (Deltatrac II Calorimeter) for making this measurement.
