Novel Regional Anesthesia Technique for Pain Management After Mastectomy
Posted: Monday, November 5, 2018
Use of a pectoralis plane nerve block before mastectomy for breast cancer may reduce postoperative pain and potentially opioid consumption and related complications. This novel regional anesthesia technique is used to treat the common symptoms of pain and impaired quality of life after surgery. Jon Y. Zhou, MD, of the University of California (UC), Davis, presented the results of this retrospective review at the Anesthesiology 2018 Annual Meeting in San Francisco (Abstract A2342).
“We encourage the use of noninvasive, opioid-sparing regional anesthetic techniques to better control acute postmastectomy pain in patients, the benefits of which appear to be multifaceted,” stated Dr. Zhou in a press release from the American Society of Anesthesiologists.
The review included electronic medical records from the UC Davis Medical Center, focusing on 152 patients who had unilateral or bilateral mastectomy between 2012 and 2017; a total of 98 patients received a pectoralis nerve plane block prior to general anesthesia, whereas 54 patients received general anesthesia alone. The group that had the pectoralis nerve plane nerve block received 10 cc of 0.25% ropivacaine between the pectoralis major and pectoralis minor muscles and another 20 cc of 0.25% ropivacaine between the pectoralis minor and serratus anterior muscles.
Dr. Zhou and colleagues found that there was a statistically significant reduction (20%) in opioid consumption during surgery and on the first day after surgery (36%) in those who received the novel nerve block compared with those who did not. However, in the postanesthesia care unit, there was no significant difference between the groups in terms of opioid consumption.
“It is a novel yet easy to teach technique that may decrease opioid consumption and its associated side effects as well as decrease prolonged hospital admission,” the investigators concluded.
