A&A practice
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Cytoreduction surgery with hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy is a complex and painful procedure that can cause postoperative hypotension and coagulopathy. Epidural analgesia may worsen hypotension and is contraindicated in the setting of coagulopathy. ⋯ They remained stable intraoperatively and had adequate pain control postoperatively. Erector spinae plane catheters may be a suitable alternative for epidural analgesia for these patients.
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The management of patients on direct oral anticoagulants (DOACs) who require emergent cardiac surgery is slowly evolving. The introduction of andexanet alfa, a novel antidote for apixaban and rivaroxaban, added a specific reversal agent to our armamentarium, but its safety and efficacy are still being investigated. ⋯ Both received perioperative andexanet alfa together with prothrombin complex concentrate (PCC) at some time during 6 hours before operative management. Heparin resistance was noted in each instance, and pump thrombosis developed in 1 case.
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Case Reports
Aphonia Following Bilateral Cervical Plexus Blocks for an Awake Hemithyroidectomy: A Case Report.
A 35-year-old female patient was scheduled for a left hemithyroidectomy. We performed bilateral cervical plexus blocks with ultrasound guidance for an awake thyroidectomy. ⋯ After an uneventful surgery, the patient spontaneously regained her normal voice in the postoperative period. The case report describes a previously unreported complication of aphonia presumably due to bilateral recurrent laryngeal nerve blocks, which might have occurred from the infiltrated local anesthetic extravasating to the deeper planes through the cervical fascia.
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A 13-year-old girl with a voltage-gated sodium channel mutation (SCN8A)-associated intractable epilepsy presented for bilateral mastectomy for painful juvenile fibroadenomatosis. Sodium channel mutations are more frequently diagnosed with continued advances in genetic testing. Understanding the effects of sodium channel mutations is important to provide safe anesthetic care to these patients. In this article, we discuss what is known regarding the physiology of SCN8A channels and the anesthetic considerations when caring for patients with an SCN8A mutation.