• Br J Anaesth · Jun 2014

    Randomized Controlled Trial

    Volatile anaesthetics and positive pressure ventilation reduce left atrial performance: a transthoracic echocardiographic study in young healthy adults.

    • D Freiermuth, K Skarvan, M Filipovic, M D Seeberger, and D Bolliger.
    • Department of Anaesthesia and Intensive Care Medicine, University Hospital Basel, CH-4031 Basel, Switzerland david.freiermuth@gmx.net.
    • Br J Anaesth. 2014 Jun 1;112(6):1032-41.

    BackgroundAnimal and in vitro studies suggest that volatile anaesthetics affect left atrial (LA) performance. We hypothesized that human LA pump function and dimensions are altered by volatile anaesthetics in vivo.MethodsWe performed transthoracic echocardiographic (TTE) measurements in 59 healthy subjects (aged 18-48 yr) undergoing minor surgery under general anaesthesia. The unpremedicated patients were randomly assigned to anaesthesia with sevoflurane, desflurane, or isoflurane. TTE examinations were performed at baseline and after induction of anaesthesia and upon placement of a laryngeal mask during spontaneous breathing. After changing to intermittent positive pressure ventilation (IPPV), an additional TTE was performed. The study focused on the velocity-time integral of late peak transmitral inflow velocity (AVTI) and maximum LA volume.ResultsWe found no evidence for relevant differences in the effects of the three volatile anaesthetics. AVTI decreased significantly from 4.1 (1.2) cm at baseline to 3.2 (1.1) cm during spontaneous breathing of 1 minimum alveolar concentration of volatile anaesthetics. AVTI decreased further to 2.8 (1.0) cm after changing to IPPV. The maximum LA volume was 45.4 (18.6) cm(3) at baseline and remained unchanged during spontaneous breathing but decreased to 34.5 (16.7) cm(3) during IPPV. Other parameters of LA pump function and dimensions decreased similarly.ConclusionsVolatile anaesthetics reduced active LA pump function in humans in vivo. Addition of IPPV decreased LA dimensions and further reduced LA pump function. Effects in vivo were less pronounced than previously found in in vitro and animal studies. Further studies are warranted to evaluate the clinical implications of these findings.Clinical Trial RegistrationNCT0024451.© The Author [2014]. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the British Journal of Anaesthesia. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.

      Pubmed     Free full text   Copy Citation     Plaintext  

      Add institutional full text...

    Notes

     
    Knowledge, pearl, summary or comment to share?
    300 characters remaining
    help        
    You can also include formatting, links, images and footnotes in your notes
    • Simple formatting can be added to notes, such as *italics*, _underline_ or **bold**.
    • Superscript can be denoted by <sup>text</sup> and subscript <sub>text</sub>.
    • Numbered or bulleted lists can be created using either numbered lines 1. 2. 3., hyphens - or asterisks *.
    • Links can be included with: [my link to pubmed](http://pubmed.com)
    • Images can be included with: ![alt text](https://bestmedicaljournal.com/study_graph.jpg "Image Title Text")
    • For footnotes use [^1](This is a footnote.) inline.
    • Or use an inline reference [^1] to refer to a longer footnote elseweher in the document [^1]: This is a long footnote..

    hide…