Thoracotomy causes severe postoperative pain, which is difficult to manage since the use of systemic analgesics often causes respiratory depression. Cryoanalgesia of the intercostal nerves has been advocated as an effective means of local analgesia without serious side effects. A prospective randomised blind trial to investigate the efficacy of the technique was carried out. A total of 53 patients undergoing thoracotomy were allocated to either the trial or a control group. At thoracotomy the surgeon was informed of the patient's trial allocation. The trial group received one minute of direct cryotherapy to at least five intercostal nerves related to the incision. All patients received methadone via the lumbar epidural route in a dose calculated according to their weight. A linear analogue assessment of postoperative pain was made by the patients as soon as they were sufficiently awake. An independent record of all postoperative analgesia was kept. After discharge from hospital further assessments were made at least six weeks after operation. Statistical analysis of the scores of postoperative pain and analgesic consumption showed that there was no significant difference between the trial and the control group. There was, however, a suggestion of an increase in the long term morbidity, although these figures were not amenable to statistical analysis. Thus it has not been possible to demonstrate a role for cryoanalgesia in the control of post thoracotomy pain.The control of postoperative pain is particularly important in thoracic surgery. Adequate postoperative analgesia must be provided without impairing the remaining respiratory function. There has therefore been some recent interest in local methods of pain relief. It has been shown by this unit that the use of epidural methadone is an effective and safe way of providing analgesia during the early postoperative phase.' It cannot, however, be used for a prolonged period and therefore interest has been focused on cryoanalgesia, which has been said to provide pain relief for up to 26 days.2 Although there are favourable reports of its efficacy,34 the impression in this unit was that there was no subjective benefit. A prospective randomised trial was therefore devised to investigate the effect of adding cryoanalgesia to a standard postoperative analgesic regimen.

The goals of the study were 1) to investigate the relationship between tracheal air pressure and the tracheostoma valve seal in patients with laryngectomy and tracheoesophageal puncture (TEP) and 2) to assess whether tracheal pressure contributes to the duration of the valve seal. Ten patients with TEP after laryngectomy underwent training with an outer Blom-Singer tracheostoma valve and a 30-day trial with this "hands-free" speaking valve. We found that tracheal pressure was not a significant predictor variable in assessing the duration of the outer tracheostoma valve seal achieved by the patients with TEP. Factors other than tracheal pressure appeared to affect the duration of the tracheostoma valve seal. Mastery of use of the tracheostoma valve, the subject's neck anatomy, and the amount of time, training, and experience that was given to each subject were significant predictors of the valve seal. Tracheal pressure measurements might be of use in deciding between a standard or a low-pressure outer tracheostoma valve for an individual patient.