US-TAP BLOCK. An Alternative in the management of pain posterior to a laparoscopic cholecystectomy at our University Hospital

Abstract

Abstract Objective Use and evaluate the US-TAP BLOCK (Ultrasound Transverse Abdominis Plane Block) for the management of postoperative pain in patients submitted to ambulatory laparoscopic cholecystectomy at the General Surgery service of the “Dr. Jose E. Gonzalez” University Hospital. Materials and methods Clinical trial, experimental, transversal, comparative, prospective, blind study with 24 patients. 12 patients in the “control” group, where pain was managed with intravenous administration of ketorolac 30 mg, and 12 patients in the “cases” group using US-TAP BLOCK with bupivacaine 0.5% for pain control. We evaluated the pain level using the Visual Analog Scale (VAS) at 1/2/4/6 h postoperatively. Whenever the patients presented severe pain (VAS >6), tramadol 50 mg was administered intravenously as a rescue drug. Results Gallbladder disease was more frequent in the female gender (87.5%), between 40–49 years old (37.5%), the majority were overweight (54.1%). The predominant histopathological diagnosis was cholecystolithiasis (38%). We observed no difference between the levels of postoperative pain in the compared groups. The use of rescue drugs was lower in the case group ( p = 0.035). Conclusions The US-TAP BLOCK is an effective analgesic technique, comparable to the standard for pain management used at our hospital, and decreases the use of rescue analgesics.