[Disorders of perioperative heat balance and their treatments]

The importance of diagnosing and preventing intraoperative hypothermia has come into the focus of interest in the past decade. It has been proved that core temperature decreases by 1-3 degrees C during the course of long-time anesthesias. As well as it has been proven that even mild hypothermia (core temperature less than 36 degrees C) leads to numerous perioperative complications influencing the outcome of the patients, such as perioperative cardiac abnormalities, increased bleeding risk and need for transfusion, decreased metabolism of the medications as well as prolonged wound healing process. It is also clear that treatment of intraoperative hypothermia may double the perioperative costs. Therefore, in the present review we intend to summarize the recent knowledge on the development, consequences and prevention of intraoperative hypothermia.