Pain management after complex spine surgery: A systematic review and procedure-specific postoperative pain management recommendations

xloma.fota13 shared this article with you from Inoreader Pain management after complex spine surgery: A systematic review and procedure-specific postoperative pain management recommendations Via European Journal of Anaesthesiology (EJA) - Published Ahead-of-Print BACKGROUND Complex spinal procedures are associated with intense pain in the postoperative period. Adequate peri-operative pain management has been shown to correlate with improved outcomes including early ambulation and early discharge. OBJECTIVES We aimed to evaluate the available literature and develop recommendations for optimal pain management after complex spine surgery. DESIGN AND DATA SOURCES A systematic review using the PROcedure SPECific postoperative pain managemenT methodology was undertaken. Randomised controlled trials and systematic reviews published in the English language from January 2008 to April 2020 assessing postoperative pain after complex spine surgery using analgesic, anaesthetic or surgical interventions were identified from MEDLINE, EMBASE and Cochrane Databases. RESULTS Out of 111 eligible studies identified, 31 randomised controlled trials and four systematic reviews met the inclusion criteria. Pre-operative and intra-operative interventions that improved postoperative pain were paracetamol, cyclo-oxygenase (COX)-2 specific-inhibitors or non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), intravenous ketamine infusion and regional analgesia techniques including epidural analgesia using local anaesthetics with or without opioids. Limited evidence was found for local wound infiltration, intrathecal and epidural opioids, erector spinae plane block, thoracolumbar interfascial plane block, intravenous lidocaine, dexmedetomidine and gabapentin. CONCLUSIONS The analgesic regimen for complex spine surgery should include pre-operative or intra-operative paracetamol and COX-2 specific inhibitors or NSAIDs, continued postoperatively with opioids used as rescue analgesics. Other recommendations are intra-operative ketamine and epidural analgesia using local anaesthetics with or without opioids. Although there is procedure-specific evidence in favour of intra-operative methadone, it is not recommended as it was compared with shorter-acting opioids and due to its limited safety profile. Furthermore, the methadone studies did not use non-opioid analgesics, which should be the primary analgesics to ultimately reduce overall opioid requirements, including methadone. Further qualitative randomised controlled trials are required to confirm the efficacy and safety of these recommended analgesics on postoperative pain relief. Correspondence to Prof. Hélène Beloeil, Pôle d'Anesthésie Réanimation Chirurgicale, CHU Rennes, 2 Rue Henri Le Guilloux, 35033 Rennes Cedex 9, France Tel: +33 2 99 28 24 22; fax: +33 2 99 28 24 21; e-mail: helene.beloeil@chu-rennes.fr Supplemental digital content is available for this article. Direct URL citations appear in the printed text and are provided in the HTML and PDF versions of this article on the journal's Website (www.ejanaesthesiology.com). This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives License 4.0 (CCBY-NC-ND), where it is permissible to download and share the work provided it is properly cited. The work cannot be changed in any way or used commercially without permission from the journal. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0 © 2021 European Society of Anaesthesiology View on the web Inoreader. Take back control of your news feed. Follow us on Twitter and Facebook.