Anaesthesia for open wrist fracture surgery in adults/elderly

Anaesthesia practice, quality indices including all-cause 30-day mortality associate to wrist fracture repositioning and surgery in Sweden: A perioperative register-based study 2018-2021

BACKGROUND

Wrist fracture is one of most common fractures frequently requiring surgical anaesthesia. There is limited information related to the anaesthetic practice and quality including 30-day mortality associated with wrist fracture in Sweden in recent years.

AIM

The aim of the present register-based study was to investigate the anaesthesia techniques used and quality indices including 30-day mortality associated with wrist fracture surgery in Sweden during the period 2018-2021.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

All fracture repositions, and surgical interventions related to wrist fracture requiring anaesthesia in patients aged >18 years registered in the Swedish Perioperative Register (SPOR) between 2018 and 2021 were included in the analysis. Information on age, ASA class, anaesthesia technique, severe operative events, most reported side-effects during recovery room stay and all-cause 30-day mortality was collected.

RESULTS

The data set included 25,147 procedures split into 14,796 females and 10,252 males (missing information n = 99) with a mean age of 52.9 ± 18.7 years and a significant age difference between females and males, 60.3 ± 15.4 and 42.2 ± 17.7 years, respectively. Mean age and ASA class increased during the study period (2018-2021), from 52.8 ± 18.6 to 54.0 ± 18.4 and ASA class 3-5 from 8.1% to 9.4% (p < .001 and p < .041, respectively). General anaesthesia (GA), GA combined with regional anaesthesia (RA), RA with or without sedation and sedation only was used in 41%, 13%, 40% and 6% of procedures, respectively, with minor changes over the study period. Pain at arrival in the recovery room (RR), (3.4%), severe pain during RR stay (2.1%), hypothermia (1.4%), postoperative nausea and vomiting (PONV) (1.2%) and urinary retention (0.5%) were the most reported side-effects during the RR stay. (RA) was associated with significantly lower occurrence of pain and PONV, and shorter RR stay, compared with GA (p < .001). The all-cause 30-day mortality was low (19 of 25,147 (0.08%)) with no differences over the period studied or anaesthetic technique.

CONCLUSION

General anaesthesia or general anaesthesia combined with regional anaesthesia are the most used anaesthetic techniques for wrist fracture procedures in Sweden. Recovery room pain, PONV, hypothermia and urinary retention is reported in overall low frequencies, with no change over the period studied, but in lower frequencies for regional anaesthesia. All-cause 30-day mortality was low; 0.08% with no change over time or between anaesthetic techniques. Thus, the present quality review based on SPOR data supports high quality of perioperative anaesthesia care.

Regional versus General Anesthesia in Postoperative Pain Management after Distal Radius Fracture Surgery: Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials

Distal radius fractures are the most prevalent upper extremity fractures, posing a significant public health concern. Recent studies comparing regional and general anesthesia for postoperative pain management after these fractures have yielded conflicting results. This meta-analysis aimed to compare the effectiveness of regional and general anesthesia concerning postoperative pain management and opioid consumption following distal radius fracture surgery. A comprehensive search was conducted in PubMed, Cochrane Library, and EMBASE databases to identify relevant randomized controlled trials. Four randomized trials involving 248 participants were included in the analysis. A pooled analysis revealed that regional anesthesia led to significantly reduced postoperative pain scores at 2 h compared to general anesthesia (SMD -2.03; 95% CI -2.88--1.17). However, no significant differences in pain scores were observed between the two anesthesia types after 12 h post-surgery. Regional anesthesia was associated with lower total opioid consumption (SMD -0.76; 95% CI -1.25--0.26) and fewer occurrences of nausea and vomiting compared to the general anesthesia. Nonetheless, opioid consumption on the first day post-discharge was significantly higher in the regional anesthesia group (SMD 0.83; 95% CI 0.47-1.20). The analgesic superiority of regional anesthesia is confined to the early postoperative hours with overall lower opioid use but a notable increase in opioid consumption on the first day post-discharge, potentially attributable to rebound pain.

Postoperative analgesia after surgical repair of distal radius fracture: a randomized comparison between distal peripheral nerve blockade and surgical site infiltration

BACKGROUND

Pain following open reduction and internal fixation of distal radius fracture (DRF) can be significant. This study compared the intensity of pain up to 48 hours after volar plating for DRF, associated to either an ultrasound guided distal nerve block (DNB) or surgical site infiltration (SSI).

METHODS

In this prospective single blind randomized study, 72 patients scheduled for DRF surgery under 1.5% lidocaine axillary block were allocated to receive, at the end of surgery, either an ultrasound-guided median and radial nerves block with ropivacaine 0.375% (DNB) performed by the anesthesiologist or a SSI with the same drug regimen, performed by the surgeon. Primary outcome was the duration between analgesic technique (H0) and pain reappearance (Numerical Rating Scale (NRS 0-10)>3). Secondary outcomes were the quality of analgesia, the quality of sleep, the magnitude of motor blockade, and the patient satisfaction. The study was built on a statistical hypothesis of equivalence.

RESULTS

Fifty-nine patients were included in the final per-protocol analysis (DNB=30, SSI=29). Time to reach NRS>3 was (in median [95%CI]) 267 min [155;727] and 164 min [120;181] respectively after DNB and SSI (difference=103 min [-22;594] - rejection of equivalence hypothesis). Pain intensity throughout the 48 hours, quality of sleep, opiate consumption, motor blockade and patient satisfaction was not significantly different between groups.

CONCLUSIONS

Although DNB provides a longer analgesia than SSI, both techniques gave comparable level of pain control during the first 48 hours after surgery, without any difference in the incidence of side effects or patient satisfaction.

Supraclavicular block with Mepivacaine vs Ropivacaine, their impact on postoperative pain: a prospective randomised study

BACKGROUND

Supraclavicular block (SCB) with long-acting local anaesthetic is commonly used for surgical repair of distal radial fractures (DRF). Studies have shown a risk for rebound pain when the block fades. This randomised single-centre study aimed to compare pain and opioid consumption the first three days post-surgery between SCB-mepivacaine vs. SCB-ropivacaine, with general anaesthesia (GA) as control.

METHODS

Patients (n = 90) with ASA physical status 1-3 were prospectively randomised to receive; SCB with mepivacine 1%, 25-30 ml (n = 30), SCB with ropivacaine 0.5%, 25-30 ml (n = 30) or GA (n = 30) with propofol/fentanyl/sevoflurane. Study objectives compared postoperative pain with Numeric Rating Scale (NRS) and sum postoperative Opioid Equivalent Consumption (OEC) during the first 3 days post-surgery between study-groups.

RESULTS

The three groups showed significant differences in postoperative pain-profile. Mean NRS at 24 h was significantly lower for the SCB-mepivacaine group (p = 0.018). Further both median NRS and median OEC day 0 to 3 were significanly lower in the SCB-mepivacaine group as compared to the SCB-ropivacaine group during the first three days after surgery; pain NRS 1 (IQR 0.3-3.3) and 2.7 (IQR 1.3-4.2) (p = 0.017) and OEC 30 mg (IQR 10-80) and 85 mg (IQR 45-125) (p = 0.004), respectively. The GA-group was in between both in pain NRS and median sum OEC. Unplanned healthcare contacts were highest among SCB-ropivacaine patients (39.3%) vs. SCB-mepivacaine patients (0%) and GA-patients (3.4%).

CONCLUSIONS

The potential benefit of longer duration of analgesia, associated to a long-acting local anaesthetic agent, during the early postoperative course must be put in perspective of potential worse pain progression following block resolution.

TRIAL REGISTRATION

NCT03749174 (clinicaltrials.gov, Nov 21, 2018, retrospectively registered).

Classification and Visualisation of Normal and Abnormal Radiographs; A Comparison between Eleven Convolutional Neural Network Architectures

This paper investigates the classification of radiographic images with eleven convolutional neural network (CNN) architectures (GoogleNet, VGG-19, AlexNet, SqueezeNet, ResNet-18, Inception-v3, ResNet-50, VGG-16, ResNet-101, DenseNet-201 and Inception-ResNet-v2). The CNNs were used to classify a series of wrist radiographs from the Stanford Musculoskeletal Radiographs (MURA) dataset into two classes-normal and abnormal. The architectures were compared for different hyper-parameters against accuracy and Cohen's kappa coefficient. The best two results were then explored with data augmentation. Without the use of augmentation, the best results were provided by Inception-ResNet-v2 (Mean accuracy = 0.723, Mean kappa = 0.506). These were significantly improved with augmentation to Inception-ResNet-v2 (Mean accuracy = 0.857, Mean kappa = 0.703). Finally, Class Activation Mapping was applied to interpret activation of the network against the location of an anomaly in the radiographs.

Internal fixation of metacarpal fractures using wide awake local anesthesia and no tourniquet

We sought to report on the use of wide-awake local anesthesia and no tourniquet (WALANT) for internal fixation of metacarpal fractures. We retrospectively examined 10 patients with metacarpal fractures that required either closed reduction and internal fixation (CRIF) or open reduction and internal fixation (ORIF). WALANT was administered 20minutes before the surgery outside the operating room. Once the area was numb, an open or closed reduction was made followed by internal fixation of the fracture using plating, intramedullary screws or Kirshner wires (K-wires). We used intraoperative X-ray to confirm anatomic reduction and correct internal fixation. After proper reduction and fixation, the active range of motion (AROM) was assessed while the patient was awake. Patients were discharged the next day after evaluating their neurovascular status and establishing pain control. Follow-up evaluations were carried out at 2, 6 and 12 weeks postoperatively. All individuals underwent uneventful operations. No significant pain or bleeding was recorded during the operation. Nine out of ten patients regained full AROM at the 12-week follow-up visit in the outpatient clinic. One patient still had slight reduction of range of motion (ROM) of the 5th metacarpophalangeal joint. No neurovascular damage or surgical site morbidity was recorded. CRIF and ORIF of simple metacarpal fractures can be executed successfully using WALANT with good functional results without increased morbidity compared to monitored anesthesia care.

Regional or General Anesthesia in the Surgical Treatment of Distal Radial Fractures: A Randomized Clinical Trial

BACKGROUND

Most patients undergoing surgery for the treatment of a distal radial fracture are treated in a day-surgery setting and are given either general anesthesia (GA) or regional anesthesia (RA). The main purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of the anesthesia method on patients' postoperative opioid consumption during the first 3 days following surgery.

METHODS

This was a single-center randomized clinical trial. A total of 88 patients aged 18 to 74 years who were undergoing day surgery for the treatment of a displaced distal radial fracture with volar-plate fixation were randomized to GA (n = 44) or RA with a supraclavicular brachial plexus blockade (n = 44). The primary outcome was total opioid equivalent consumption (OEC) during the first 3 postoperative days (72 hours). Secondary outcomes included OEC during days 1, 2, and 3, visual analog scale (VAS) for pain scores, maximum pain, postoperative nausea and vomiting, perioperative time consumption (surgical, preoperative, and postoperative anesthesia care time), functional outcomes, and Patient-Rated Wrist Evaluation (PRWE) and EuroQol-5 Dimensions-3 Levels (EQ-5D-3L) scores up to 6 months.

RESULTS

The total median OEC during the first 3 postoperative days was 85 mg (range, 0 to 218 mg) in the GA group and 60 mg (range, 3 to 150 mg) in the RA group (p = 0.1). The groups differed significantly in OEC and VAS for pain scores during the first 24 hours after surgery; the median OEC was higher in the GA group before discharge (p < 0.001), while it was higher in the RA group after discharge (p < 0.001). Patients in the GA group reported more pain immediately after surgery (median score, 6; width of interquartile range [IQR], 7) and at 2 hours postoperatively (median score, 2; width of IQR, 3) compared with patients in the RA group (median score, 0; width of IQR, 0 at both time points) (p < 0.001). Maximum pain occurred at a median of 1 hour (range, 1 hour to 22 hours) after the end of surgery in the GA group compared with a median of 11 hours (range, 1 hour to 24 hours) in the RA group (p < 0.001). The total median perioperative time consumption was 244 minutes (range, 114 to 389 minutes) in the GA group compared with 146 minutes (range, 74 to 390 minutes) in the RA group (p < 0.001). There were no significant differences in functional outcomes or PRWE or EQ-5D-3L scores at 6 months.

CONCLUSIONS

The anesthesia method (GA vs. RA) significantly influenced the early patterns of postoperative pain and opioid consumption after surgical treatment of a distal radial fracture, but neither total OEC over the first 3 postoperative days nor longer-term outcomes differed between the groups.

LEVEL OF EVIDENCE

Therapeutic Level I. See Instructions for Authors for a complete description of levels of evidence.