Early Outcomes Following off-Pump Coronary Artery Bypass Surgery under General Anaesthesia with and without High Thoracic Epidural Analgesia: A Comparative Study

Introduction: Reduction of postoperative morbidity by providing optimal pain relief and improving overall quality of care is an important goal of modern anaesthesia practice. The aim of this prospective, randomized, open, controlled study is to investigate the impact of high thoracic epidural analgesia on early clinical outcomes in patients undergoing off-pump coronary artery bypass (OPCAB) surgery. Methodology: After obtaining the institutional ethics committee approval and written informed consent from all patients, 80 patients of either sex, aged 40 – 70 years, scheduled for elective primary OPCAB surgery were randomized into two groups. Group I received 4 mL of an epidural bolus of 1% ropivacaine and fentanyl 100 µg followed by ropivacaine 1% and fentanyl 5 µg/mL infusion for 72 h at 3–5 mL/h postoperatively. Analgesia in the Group II was provided with a continuous IV fentanyl infusion. Patients were given rescue analgesic (inj Tramadol intravenous) when VAS score is >40 in the postoperative period. Results: VAS score, need for rescue analgesics and incidence of postoperative arrythmia were significantly lower in Group I specially for first twenty four hours postoperatively. Time for extubation and length of postoperative ICU stay were found similar in both the groups. Incidence of other outcomes found to be not significant. Conclusion: The pain scores, analgesic requirements and incidence perioperative arryrhmias were significantly less in Group I compared to Group II, but we could not be able to find any significant difference in time for extubation and length of ICU stay, neither in incidence of postoperative MI, CVA, renal failure, blood transfusion and death.