Title:Changing Pain Management Strategy from Opioid-centric Towards Improve Postoperative
Cognitive Dysfunction with Dexmedetomidine
Volume: 23
Issue: 1
Author(s): Chunhong Su*, Xiaojun Ren, Hongpei Wang, Xiaomei Ding and Jian Guo
Affiliation:
- Department of Pain, Lanzhou University Second Hospital, Lanzhou, Gansu, China
Keywords:
Opioid intake, dexmedetomidine, psychological factors, postoperative cognitive dysfunction, catastrophic thinking, femoral neck fractures.
Abstract:
Objective: This study was aimed to investigate the effectiveness of dexmedetomidine (DEX) on improving
the level of pain and disability to find out the possible correlation between psychological factors with pain management
satisfaction and physical function in patients with femoral neck fractures.
Methods: One hundred twenty-four adult patients with stable femoral neck fractures (type I and II, Garden classification)
who underwent internal fixation, were prospectively enrolled including 62 patients in the DEX group and 62
patients in the control group. The magnitude of disability using Harris Hip Score, Postoperative Cognitive Dysfunction
(POCD) using Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE score), Quality of Recovery (QoR-40), pain-related
anxiety (PASS-20), pain management and pain catastrophizing scale (PCS) were recorded on the first and second day
after surgery.
Results: The DEX group on the first and second days after surgery exhibited higher quality of recovery scores,
greater satisfaction with pain management, low disability scores, less catastrophic thinking, lower pain anxiety,
greater mini mental state examination scores and less opioid intake and the differences were statistically significant
compared with the control group (P<0.001). Emergence agitation and incidence of POCD were significantly less in
the DEX group (P<0.001). Decreased disability was associated with less catastrophic thinking and lower pain anxiety,
but not associated with more opioid intake (P<0.001). Higher QoR-40 scores had a negative correlation with
more catastrophic thinking and more opioid intake (P<0.001). Greater satisfaction with pain management was correlated
with less catastrophic thinking and less opioid intake (P<0.001).
Conclusion: Using DEX as an adjunct to anesthesia could significantly improve postoperative cognitive dysfunction
and the quality of recovery and these improvements were accompanied by decrease in pain, emergence agitation, and
opioid consumption by DEX administration. Since pain relief and decreased disability were not associated with prescribing
greater amounts of opioid intake in the patients, improving psychological factors, including reducing catastrophic
thinking or self-efficacy about pain, could be a more effective strategy to reduce pain and disability, meanwhile
reducing opioid prescription in the patients. Our findings showed that DEX administration is safe sedation with
anti-inflammatory, analgesic and antiemetic effects and it could help change pain management strategy from opioidcentric
towards improved postoperative cognitive dysfunction.