Study of patient pain management after heart surgery

To investigate postoperative pain control and analgesic use after heart surgery.

20 patients undergone heart surgery, randomly entered the study. Each patient was asked to score his pain intensity on visual analog scale (VAS) at four different occasions.

120 patients aged 59 year-old; including 81 male were enrolled in the study. 69.2% had coronary artery disease and 16.7% had heart-valve problem. Main types of surgeries were coronary artery bypass surgery (70.5%) and valve repairement (23%). Duration of ICU stay was 4.78±2.7 days and duration of intubations was 17.38 ± 36.46 hours. Pre-surgery pain relief was administrated to 42% of the subjects and morphine and promethazine was the main pre-surgery analgesia medication. Post surgery analgesic included morphine (injection), petidine (injection) and NSAIDS (oral or rectal). According to VAS, mean pain level, 1 and 4 hours after extubation, and before and one hour after transferring to wards was 5.05±2.5, 4.09±2.0, 3.52±1.8, 2.36±1.89, respectively. Although the level of pain reported was mostly moderate, 80% were reported satisfaction with their post-surgery pain management.

A closer pain management control is needed for patients after heart surgery. Introduction of newer pain management techniques, medications and dosages could reduce the pain and suffering.