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Object. The authors' goal was to determine whether the incidence of postoperative sore throat, hoarseness, and dysphagia associated with anterior spine surgery is reduced by maintaining endotracheal tube cuff pressure (ETCP) at 20 mm Hg during the period of neck retraction. Methods. Fifty-one patients scheduled for anterior cervical spine surgery were enrolled. After intubation, ETCP was adjusted to 20 mm Hg in all patients. Following placement of neck retractors, ETCP was measured. Patients were randomized to a control (no adjustment) or treatment group (ETCP adjusted to 20 mm Hg). A blinded observer questioned the patients about the presence of sore throat, dysphagia, and hoarseness at 1 hour, 24 hours, and 1 week postoperatively. No differences between groups at 1 hour postoperatively were demonstrated. At 24 hours, 51% of patients in the treatment group complained of sore throat compared with 74% of control patients (p < 0.05). Sixty-five percent of the women experienced sore throat compared with 35% of the men (p < 0.05). At 24 hours, longer retraction time correlated with development of dysphagia (p < 0.05, r2 = 0.61). At 24 hours, hoarseness was present in 65% of women and 20% of men (p < 0.05). Conclusions. The results of this study suggest the following three predictors of postoperative throat discomfort following anterior cervical spine surgery in which neck retraction is performed: increased ETCP during neck retraction (sore throat), neck retraction time (dysphagia), and female sex (sore throat and hoarseness). The simple maneuver of decreasing ETCP to 20 mm Hg may be helpful in improving patient comfort following anterior cervical spine surgery.

Wound perfusion and oxygenation are important determinants of the development of postoperative wound infections. Supplemental fluid administration significantly increases tissue oxygenation in surrogate wounds in the subcutaneous tissue of the upper arm in perioperative surgical patients. We tested the hypothesis that supplemental fluid administration during and after elective colon resections Implications: Supplemental perioperative intravenous fluid administration did not reduce the rate of wound infection. The apparent lack of benefit may have resulted because hydration's effect on intestinal oxygenation is modest or because the statistical power of our study was limited. Nonetheless, our results suggest that supplemental hydration in the range tested does not impact wound infection rate. were randomly assigned to small (n=124, 8 mL·kg -1 ·h -1 ) or large volume (n=129, 16-18 mL·kg -1 ·h -1 ) fluid management. Our major outcomes were two distinct criteria for diagnosis of surgical wound infections: 1) purulent exudate combined with a culture positive for pathogenic bacteria and 2) Center for Disease Control criteria for diagnosis of surgical wound infections. All wound infections diagnosed using either criterion by a blinded observer in the 15 days following surgery were considered in the analysis. Wound healing was evaluated with the ASEPSIS scoring system. Of the patients given small fluid administration, 14 had surgical wound infections; 11 given large fluid therapy had infections, P=0.46. ASEPSIS wound healing scores were similar in both groups: 7±16 (small volume) vs. 8±14 (large volume), P=0.70. Our results suggest that supplemental hydration in the range tested does not impact wound infection rate. NIH Public AccessAuthor Manuscript Anesth Analg. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2006 November 1.

Background: Forced-air warming is sometimes unable to maintain perioperative normothermia. We therefore compared heat transfer, regional heat distribution, and core rewarming of forced-air warming with a novel circulating-water garment.