Peritonsillar Ropivacaine Infiltration in Paediatric Tonsillectomy: A Randomised Control Trial

Various efforts have been made to reduce post tonsillectomy pain in children. The present study was undertaken to evaluate the efficacy and safety of Ropivacaine in post-operative pain management in these children.

This study is a Randomized control study on 140 patients between 4 - 12 years of age, in whom tonsillectomy was performed in a tertiary care centre between January 2017 to November 2018 using standard dissection and snare surgical technique. Postoperatively, patients were randomized into 2 groups of 70 patients each, receiving tonsillar fossa infiltration with 0.2% Ropivacaine or 0.9% normal saline respectively. Patients were assessed as per Wong Baker's Faces Scoring System at 2 hours, 4 hours, 8 hours, 18 hours, 24 hours, and 48 hours postoperatively. All the results were analyzed by SPSS software. Chi- square test and Mann-Whitney test were used for assessment of level of significance, with P- value of less than 0.05 taken as significant.

Both the groups were comparable with respect to age and sex. At 48 hours, in study group, maximum number of patients 35 (50%) had Wong Baker score 0, while in control group, maximum number of patients 52 (74.3%) had Wong Baker score 4 (P< 0.01). The difference in the mean Deglutition time between both groups was significant (P< 0.01).

Ropivacaine infiltration is a effective modality for post-tonsillectomy pain management in children, with minimal side-effects.