The Effectiveness of Four Intervention Methods for Preventing Inadvertent Perioperative Hypothermia During Total Knee...

Inadvertent perioperative hypothermia (IPH) occurs when a patient experiences a core temperature below 36° C (96.8° F) in perioperative settings and is a preventable risk factor for anesthesia- and surgery-related complications. Forced-air warming is an effective method to maintain normothermia. This study compared four interventions for preventing IPH for 120 patients undergoing primary elective unilateral total knee or total hip arthroplasty. The study was based on a time series nonequivalent comparison group design to investigate whether the incidence of IPH differed among treatment groups. We also sought to determine whether the patients' preoperative perceptions of warmth or cold correlated with core body temperatures. Patients receiving convective warming and prewarming appeared to experience fewer IPH events than patients in the other study groups. This study suggests that hypothermia is a common issue for patients undergoing total knee or total hip arthroplasty and that it may be possible to reduce its frequency.