Anesthesia and analgesia
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The purpose of this study was to investigate the incidence of technical problems encountered when performing continuous spinal anesthesia and the influence of catheter tip position on block height following injection of a hypobaric spinal anesthetic. Twenty-nine elderly patients undergoing hip surgery were studied. Lumbar puncture was performed with an 18-gauge Tuohy needle at the L3-4 (or L2-3) interspace. ⋯ Although threading difficulties were encountered in 4/28 cases, there was a 100% success rate in catheter insertion. One catheter displacement into the epidural space was noted. Twenty of twenty-eight catheters took a cephalad direction, 6 remained coiled in a horizontal position, and 2 took a caudal direction.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)