Prevalence and associated factors of postoperative suxamethonium-induced myalgia in surgical patients at Debre Tabor Comprehensive Specialized Hospital Ethiopia: a cross-sectional study

Abstract

Suxamethonium is considered by many to be the best drug for providing ideal intubating conditions, short surgical procedures, and rapid sequence induction. However, its usefulness is limited by the frequent occurrence of adverse effects like postoperative myalgia. Therefore this study aimed to assess the prevalence and associated factors of postoperative suxamethonium-induced myalgia. An institutional-based cross-sectional study was conducted on 210 patients who underwent surgery with general anesthesia. The data was collected by using structured and pretested questionnaires and analyzed using SPSS version 20.0. Logistic regression was conducted to identify significant predictors based on a P-value of less than 0.05 with a 95% confidence level. Among 210 patients the prevalence of suxamethonium-induced postoperative myalgia in the first 48 h was 88 (41.9%). Patients having previous anesthesia and surgical exposure (AOR 5.29, 95% CI 1.86–15.05), patients having a co-existing disease (AOR 2.69, 95% CI 1.08–6.67), patients that had not taken premedication (analgesia) (AOR 4.64, 95% CI 1.69–12.74), anesthesia maintenance using halothane (AOR 4.5 95% CI 1.7–11.4) and relaxation maintained with suxamethonium (AOR 3.1, 95% CI 1.2–8.1) were significantly associated with the prevalence of postoperative myalgia. The magnitude of suxamethonium-induced postoperative myalgia was high. So it is better to do with preventive techniques. As much as possible it is better to avoid using suxamethonium and necessary to use better to Premedicate with nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and non-depolarizing neuromuscular medications.