Immediate postoperative refeeding in orthopedic surgery is safe

The purpose of this retrospective study was to investigate the morbidity of immediate postoperative refeeding after orthopedic surgery. We included all the 1077 patients who underwent orthopedic surgery between January and December 2003 at our military teaching hospital. General anesthesia was perfo...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of anesthesia 2005-11, Vol.19 (4), p.323-324
Main Authors: Rimmelé, Thomas, Combourieu, Emmanuel, Wey, Pierre-François, Boselli, Emmanuel, Allaouchiche, Bernard, Chassard, Dominique, Escarment, Jacques
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Anesthesia
Care and treatment
Complications
Dosage and administration
Eating
Female
Humans
Male
Middle Aged
Orthopedic surgery
Orthopedics
Postoperative Care
Retrospective Studies
Surgery
Citations: Items that this one cites
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The purpose of this retrospective study was to investigate the morbidity of immediate postoperative refeeding after orthopedic surgery. We included all the 1077 patients who underwent orthopedic surgery between January and December 2003 at our military teaching hospital. General anesthesia was performed in 37% of the patients (n = 398), 24% (n = 259) had combined general and regional anesthesia, and 39% (n = 420) had isolated regional anesthesia (spinal anesthesia and/or peripheral regional anesthesia). After surgery, each patient was allowed free access to solid and liquid food immediately after discharge from the postanesthetic care unit. Although no systematic nausea and vomiting prophylaxis was performed, only 7% (n = 75) of the patients had postoperative nausea and vomiting during the first 48 h. Moreover, neither deglutition trouble nor aspiration syndrome was observed during that period. Our results suggest that immediate postoperative refeeding after orthopedic surgery is safe, does not increase postoperative nausea and vomiting, and probably increases the comfort of patients.
ISSN:0913-8668
1438-8359
DOI:10.1007/s00540-005-0337-x