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Published on: August 11, 2015
Cardiac arrest after intracisternal papaverine instillation during intracranial aneurysm surgery. Case report
Bulent Baltaci1, Hulya Basar, Ayse Ozcan
1Department of Anaesthesiology and Reanimation, Ankara Training and Research Hospital, Ministry of Health, Ankara, Turkey.
Abstract:
Cerebral vasospasm induced by aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage is still a leading cause of morbidity and death. This 50-year-old man underwent surgery for aneurysm clipping. After the aneurysm was clipped, papaverine was instilled into the surgical area. Bradycardia, hypotension, and sinus arrest developed in the first minute after applying the papaverine. Thus, the authors concluded that the application of papaverine to the surgical area can result in fatal bradycardia and hypotension.
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