Annals of plastic surgery
-
Annals of plastic surgery · Aug 2015
Randomized Controlled TrialThe Importance of the Trigeminal Cardiac Reflex in Rhinoplasty Surgery.
Trigeminocardiac reflex (TCR) consists of bradycardia or asystole along with hypotension and apnea coinciding with stimulation of the trigeminal nerve. During rhinoplasty procedures, we noticed that local anesthetic solution (LAS) application to the columellar area results in bradycardia. We planned to conduct a randomized prospective study on 47 patients undergoing rhinoplasty to demonstrate the characteristics of TCR arising from the columella. ⋯ We concluded that stimulation of a sensory branch of the trigeminal nerve in the columellar area leads to TCR under general anesthesia by eliciting clinical hypotension with a drop in systolic BP and in HR of more than 20% compared to the baseline level.Knowing the existence of a certain TCR area will be helpful to the surgeon and anesthesiologist to exercise extra vigilance and to make continuous and meticulous monitoring of the electrocardiogram, HR, and BP during which the TCR may be precipitated such as local anesthetic infiltration to the columellar area in rhinoseptoplasty operations.