Gastric Volume and Its Relationship to Underlying Pathology or Acid-suppressing Medication

Pulmonary aspiration during sedation is a major concern for sedation providers, making identifying high-risk patients a priority. Gastric fluid volume (GFV), an accepted risk factor for aspiration, has not been well characterized in fasting children. We hypothesized that GFV would increase with gastrointestinal (GI) pathology and decrease with regular acid-suppressor use.

The primary objective was to determine baseline GFV in fasting children. The secondary objectives were to evaluate the effect of GI pathology and regular use of acid-suppressing medications on GFV.

This was prospective, observational study.

We endoscopically aspirated and measured GFV of 212 children fasting for >6 h who were sedated for esophagogastroduodenoscopy (EGD). Inclusion criteria were children up to 21 years of age, with the American Society of Anesthesiologists physical Status I and II presenting for elective EGD. After determining baseline GFV, the effect of GI pathology and effect of regular acid-suppressing medication use on GFV was analyzed.

Analysis of variance was used to compare the GFV among ages and pathology and medication groups. Student's t-test was used to compare GFV between genders and also to compare GFV in confounder analyses.

For the studied 212 children, average GFV was 0.469 ± 0.448 mL/kg (0-2.663 mL/kg). We found no association between GI pathology and GFV (P = 0.147), or acid-suppressor use and GFV (P = 0.360).

Average GFV in this study falls within the range of prior EGD-measured GFV in fasting children. Contrary to our hypothesis, we found no association between pathologies or regular acid-suppressor use on GFV. On the basis of GFV, children with GI disorders or those using acid-suppressors do not appear to pose an increased risk of aspiration. Future studies should discern differences in effects on GFV of immediate preprocedural versus the regular use of acid-suppressing medications.