Complications related to regional anesthesia.

R anesthesia techniques have been performed 12 times more often in the last 2 decades compared with previous decades, and this enormous increase may be related to the advantages of regional anesthesia and rarity of its serious complications.1 The emerging point of this study was the increasing incidence of regional anesthesia practice in our clinic, and the fact that the applications were performed by the residents under the supervision of the specialists. The aim of this study was to investigate complications related to regional anesthesia practice as well as its frequency and treatment. This retrospective study was conducted in the Anesthesiology and Reanimation Clinic of Ankara Numune Training and Research Hospital in Ankara, Turkey. Between December 2004 and November 2005, 1041 patients that had regional anesthesia for surgery were analyzed retrospectively after the approval of our Institution’s Ethical Committee. The data were obtained from the information in the regional anesthesia sheets. These sheets included the demographic data and American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) physical classification of the patient as well as the data on the type of the operation. The complications were classified into 3 groups as perioperative, procedure-related, and postoperative, and the time that they appeared and their management was also recorded. The analysis of the data was performed using the SPSS package program version 11.5. Descriptive statistics were stated as median (minimum-maximum) or frequency (%). Chi square or Fisher’s exact test was used for categorical comparisons. Mann Whitney U test, or Kruskal Wallis analysis of variance was used to compare the groups for continuous measurements. p<0.05 was regarded as statistically significant. The mean age of patients was 52.69 ±15.81 years (18-95). Of the total cases, 696 (66.9%) were male and 345 (33.1%) female. The numbers and the ratios of the types of regional anesthesia procedures, which were performed in our clinic, were 585 (56.2%) spinal, 263 (25.3%) combined spinal epidural (CSE), 182 (17.5%) epidural, and 11 (1.1%) peripheral nerve blocks. The complications related to the procedure of regional anesthesia that appeared during the operation were hypotension in 107 patients (10.27%), bradycardia in 46 patients (4.4%), nausea and vomiting in 35 patients (3.4%), insufficient block in 44 patients (4.22%), motor aphasia in one patient (0.1%), and respiratory and cardiac arrest in 3 patients (0.3%). One of those incidences resulted in death of the patient (0.096%) (Table 1). Postoperative complications were low back pain in 48 patients (4.7%), post dural puncture headache (PDPH) in 42 patients (4.1%), neck pain Brief Communication