Anestesia locorregional para cirurgias ortopédicas em cães e gatos no hospital veterinário da UFPB entre 2018 a 2022

Abstract

Orthopedic surgeries constitute a significant portion of a veterinary surgical center's routine, and they often entail a degree of pain ranging from moderate to intense. Therefore, satisfactory analgesic control before surgical intervention leads to a more stable procedure, faster recovery, and a lower incidence of post-operative pain. In this regard, locoregional anesthesia has proven to be extremely effective, making the adoption of anesthetic blocks crucial in veterinary practice. In light of the above, the objective was to conduct a survey of the locoregional blocks used in orthopedic surgeries performed on dogs and cats at the Veterinary Hospital of the Federal University of Paraíba from January 2018 to December 2022. For this research, information from patient records and anesthetic records related to animal identification, anesthetic risk, procedures performed, and anesthetic protocol of animals undergoing orthopedic surgeries during the specified period were manually collected. Locoregional anesthesia protocols were quantitatively analyzed. During the period from 2018 to 2022, 243 orthopedic surgeries were performed, of which 85.8% received some form of locoregional block. The canine species predominated in this study, accounting for 72.5% of the operated animals. Procedures were divided into groups, in pelvic limb surgeries (58.85%), epidural anesthesia was the most commonly used locoregional block, present in approximately 85% of these procedures. In thoracic limb surgeries (23.46%), brachial plexus block was the method of choice, performed in about 84% of these surgeries. Mandibular and maxillary nerve blocks were nearly unanimous in oral surgeries (12.34%), accounting for approximately 94% of blocks in that region. For procedures involving extremities (2.88%), sacrococcygeal and intercoccygeal approaches for epidural anesthesia in caudectomy, and circular infiltrative anesthesia for digit amputation were predominant, representing 66.66% and 50%, respectively. In conclusion, there is a wide variety of locoregional anesthesia techniques for different surgical approaches in orthopedics, and these techniques, due to their crucial importance in providing analgesia during these procedures, should be studied. A trained professional can promote greater well-being and analgesic comfort for their patient during the intraoperative and post-operative periods.