Postoperative obstructive sleep apnea and delirium?

1392 December 2012 We read with interest the recent article by Flink et al.1 in which the authors evaluated the frequency of postoperative delirium (POD) in 106 elderly patients aged 65 yr or older after elective knee replacement. The screening for POD was thorough and well-conducted with recognized screening tools, with an incidence of 25% on days 2–3 postoperatively. The pathophysiologic mechanisms are multiple, including anemia, electrolyte disturbances, infection, pain, and benzodiazepine and opioid use.2 Patients with obstructive sleep apnea are at an increased risk of postoperative complications in general, and this is especially true when combined with opioid-based analgesia in the postoperative period.2,3 It is therefore unfortunate that this otherwise well-conducted study did not include data on pain, opioid use, and other sedatives, because this may worsen the adverse effects of obstructive sleep apnea. In addition, there was little specific information on the anesthetic technique per se. The incidence of POD of 25% seems high in an elective, nondemented surgical population. Our group recently found no cases of POD in a similar population of patients undergoing knee and hip replacement.4 However, our patients received multimodal optimized care with reduced opioid use and only moderate postoperative pain, combined with short length of stay (mean 2.6 days). We believe that future studies evaluating the complex cognitive outcome of POD with multiple pathophysiologic mechanisms should include an optimized multimodal enhanced recovery program (the fast-track methodology)3–5 to provide a better understanding of POD and preventive techniques.