Pre-emptive Scalp Infiltration With Dexamethasone Plus Ropivacaine for Post-Craniotomy Pain in Children

Summary

At present, pediatric postoperative analgesia has not been fully understood and controlled, particularly craniotomy surgery. On the one hand, professional evaluation of postoperative pain for young children is difficult; on the other hand, the particularity of craniotomy adds (such as consciousness obstacle, sleepiness, et al) disturbance to the pain assessment in children. Although opioids administration is regarded as the first-line analgesic for post-craniotomy pain management, it may be associated with delayed awakening, respiratory depression, hypercarbia and it may interfere with the neurologic examination. For the avoidance of side-effects of systemic opioids, local anesthetics administered around the incision have been performed clinically. However, some studies revealed that the analgesic effect of local anesthetics was unsatisfactory due to its short pain relief duration, steroid as adjuvant can enhance postoperative analgesia and prolong postoperative analgesia time. As is reported that postoperative pain of craniotomy is mainly caused by skin incision and reflection of muscles, preventing the liberation of inflammatory mediators around the incision seems to be more effective than simply blocking nerve conduction. Researchers have clarified that the addition of dexamethasone to local infiltration of analgesia could provide significant analgesic effects and significantly prolong the duration of analgesic effects without obvious complications for various types of surgeries. To date, no studies have evaluated the addition of dexamethasone to local infiltration for patients receiving craniotomy. Thus, investigators suppose that pre-emptive scalp infiltration with steroid (Dexamethasone) plus local anesthetic (ropivacaine) could relieve postoperative pain after craniotomy in children.

Timeline

Start

2019-09-02

Primary completion

2020-06-05

Completion

2020-07-05

Publications

• Background Bronco A, Pietrini D, Lamperti M, Somaini M, Tosi F, del Lungo LM, Zeimantz E, Tumolo M, Lampugnani E, Astuto M, Perna F, Zadra N, Meneghini L, Benucci V, Bussolin L, Scolari A, Savioli A, Locatelli BG, Prussiani V, Cazzaniga M, Mazzoleni F, Giussani C, Rota M, Ferland CE, Ingelmo PM. Incidence of pain after craniotomy in children. Paediatr Anaesth. 2014 Jul;24(7):781-7. doi: 10.1111/pan.12351. Epub 2014 Jan 28.
• Background Basali A, Mascha EJ, Kalfas I, Schubert A. Relation between perioperative hypertension and intracranial hemorrhage after craniotomy. Anesthesiology. 2000 Jul;93(1):48-54. doi: 10.1097/00000542-200007000-00012.
• Background Law-Koune JD, Szekely B, Fermanian C, Peuch C, Liu N, Fischler M. Scalp infiltration with bupivacaine plus epinephrine or plain ropivacaine reduces postoperative pain after supratentorial craniotomy. J Neurosurg Anesthesiol. 2005 Jul;17(3):139-43. doi: 10.1097/01.ana.0000171730.41008.da.
• Background Ikeuchi M, Kamimoto Y, Izumi M, Fukunaga K, Aso K, Sugimura N, Yokoyama M, Tani T. Effects of dexamethasone on local infiltration analgesia in total knee arthroplasty: a randomized controlled trial. Knee Surg Sports Traumatol Arthrosc. 2014 Jul;22(7):1638-43. doi: 10.1007/s00167-013-2367-5. Epub 2013 Jan 11.
• Background Ju NY, Cui GX, Gao W. Ropivacaine plus dexamethasone infiltration reduces postoperative pain after tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy. Int J Pediatr Otorhinolaryngol. 2013 Nov;77(11):1881-5. doi: 10.1016/j.ijporl.2013.08.037. Epub 2013 Sep 8.

Drugs

Indications

No indication recorded.