Single Shot Lumbar Erector Spinae Plane (ESP) Block in Total Hip Replacement (THR)

Analgesia Clinical Trial

Official title:

Single Shot Lumbar Erector Spinae Plane (ESP) Block in Total Hip Replacement (THR): a Randomized Control Trial

Clinical Trial Details — Status: Completed

Administrative data

• NCT number: NCT04388553
• Other study ID #: NTWC/REC/20007
• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Start date: July 1, 2020
• Est. completion date: November 20, 2021

Study information

• Verified date: April 2024
• Source: Tuen Mun Hospital
• Contact: n/a
• Is FDA regulated: No
• Study type: Interventional

Clinical Trial Summary

Total hip replacement is a common orthopaedic procedure that improves pain and mobility in a variety of pathologies like osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis and avascular necrosis. Post-operative complications, for instance, venous thromboembolism and chest infection have long been documented in literature. These complications can have a bearing on long term survival, and may be prevented by early mobilisation. Therefore, pain control plays an important role in enhancing post-operative recovery, which may also shorten length of stay and reduce overall cost.

Multimodal analgesia is applied to these patient, with combination of opioid, oral adjuvant and regional anaesthesia. Each of the components has its own limitation; for opioid, post-operative nausea and vomiting (PONV) and respiratory depression limits its use, and adjuvants like non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAID) are contraindicated in certain patient populations (renal impairment, ischaemic heart disease, coagulopathy). Various regional techniques like femoral nerve block, fascia iliaca block, lumbar plexus block, paravertebral block and epidural anaesthesia are proposed but may be limited by incomplete coverage (due to the innervation by femoral and obturator nerve for the anterior aspect of the joint and sciatic nerve for the posterior aspect, with contribution of lateral cutaneous nerve of thigh for the wound), the invasive nature of the regional technique (psoas haematoma for lumbar plexus block, epidural haematoma for epidural anaesthesia (EA)) or cardiovascular effects like hypotension from EA.

Erector spinae block, first introduced by in 2016 as a chronic pain intervention, was also used in hip surgery from a case report in 2018. However, currently the evidence for lumbar ESP block is limited mainly to case reports, while randomised control trial is scarce. More concrete data are required to determine the efficacy of this novel technique.

It is postulated that single shot lumbar ESP injected at L1 level can 1) reduced post-operative pain score 2) reduced post-operative 24 hour opioid (fentanyl) use. This study is conducted in Tuen Mun hospital (TMH) and Pok Oi hospital (POH) in Hong Kong. Patient are recruited for the study during pre-anaesthetic assessment, and they are counselled for risk of general anaesthesia and erector spinae plane block (i.e. local infection/bleeding, injury to neighbouring structure, local anaesthetic toxicity).

Description:

After a pilot study regarding opioid use for patient after THR, the sample size for either treatment or control arm is calculated to be 35 patients per group to achieve adequate power to detect such a difference.

Sealed opaque envelopes with allocation inside is prepared forehand and is subsequently drawn on the day of surgery. The attending anaesthetist receives the envelope right before induction, and opens the envelope after the patient is put under general anaesthesia (GA). If the operation is cancelled or the patient cannot use PCA post-operatively (e.g. post-operative mechanical ventilation) or post-operative delirium), the envelope is put back into the pool.

After the patient is put under GA and turned lateral, the envelope is opened. For the treatment arm, lumbar ESP block is performed while for control arm no regional anaesthesia is performed nor saline is injected into the ESP. Before proceeding to ESP block, the back is cleaned with aseptic technique and draped. 40 mL of 0.25% levobupivacaine (or maximum of 2mg/kg body weight made up to same volume) is injected into the ESP.

After the injection, the surgeon is told not to infiltrate any local anaesthetics into the incision site or the wound. Intra-operatively, intravenous fentanyl is given as the only analgesic by the attending anaesthetist. Post-operatively, the patient is given fentanyl PCA of standard setting anaesthetist). The patient is also given all the pre-operative regular oral analgesic agents post-operatively, including paracetamol, NSAID, gabapentinoid and/or weak opioid (DF118 or tramadol).

The patient is assessed by an independent assessor from the acute pain service team 24 hours after the operation, who is blinded from the allocation result. Primary outcomes, that are post-operative 12 and 24 hour PCA fentanyl use and pain score in numeric rating scale (NRS) from 0 to 10 at rest and upon mobilisation are assessed and documented in the electronic system and also the patient chart. Secondary outcomes like presence/absence of PONV and knee flexion power in MRC scale are also noted.

The data are collected by the investigator and input to Excel 2003. 2-sided student's t test is used to compare the primary outcomes and also knee flexion power between treatment group and control group, while the rate of PONV between two groups is compared by Chi-square test. Multi-variate regression is done to control for the effect of oral analgesics on study outcomes.

Recruitment information / eligibility

• Status: Completed
• Enrollment: 71
• Est. completion date: November 20, 2021
• Est. primary completion date: November 20, 2021
• Accepts healthy volunteers: No
• Gender: All
• Age group: 18 Years and older

Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria:

• Adult patients (age >=18)

• American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) class 1-3

• primary elective unilateral THR

• understand and accept the risk for general anaesthesia and ESP block

• counselled of post-operative patient controlled analgesia (PCA) and deemed fit for its use.

Exclusion Criteria:

• emergency THR

• bilateral THR

• revision THR

• THR done under neuraxial technique (e.g. spinal anaesthesia, combined spinal epidural anaesthesia)

• Patient with contraindication for ESP block (i.e. patient refusal, injection site infection or spine pathology/surgery, coagulopathy with international normalised ratio (INR) > 1.4 and thrombocytopenia < 75 x 10^9/L)

• patient who are mentally incompetent

• severe obesity (Body Mass Index >= 35)

• severe obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (Apnoea hypopnoea index >= 30, no matter on treatment or not)

• patient on regular strong opioid (e.g. morphine, oxycodone, methadone, buprenorphine, fentanyl)

• patient who have undergone hip neurolysis

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Analgesia
• Total Hip Replacement

Intervention

Procedure:
• single shot lumbar Erector Spinae Plane block
unilateral (operative side), performed at L1 level, under ultrasound guidance

Locations

Country	Name	City	State
Hong Kong	Department of Anaesthesia and Intensive Care, Tuen Mun Hospital	Hong Kong

Sponsors (1)

Lead Sponsor	Collaborator
Tuen Mun Hospital

Country where clinical trial is conducted

Hong Kong, 

References & Publications (21)

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Australian and New Zealand College of Anaesthetists. PM01 (Appendix 2): Opioid dose Equivalence - Calculation of Oral Morphine Equivalent Daily Dose (oMEDD). 2021.

Chandrasekaran S, Ariaretnam SK, Tsung J, Dickison D. Early mobilization after total knee replacement reduces the incidence of deep venous thrombosis. ANZ J Surg. 2009 Jul;79(7-8):526-9. doi: 10.1111/j.1445-2197.2009.04982.x. — View Citation

Chow SC, Shao J, Wang H. Sample Size Calculations in Clinical Research. 2nd ed. Chapman & Hall/CRC; 2008.

Davies A, Crossley A, Harper M, O'Loughlin E. Lateral cutaneous femoral nerve blockade-limited skin incision coverage in hip arthroplasty. Anaesth Intensive Care. 2014 Sep;42(5):625-30. doi: 10.1177/0310057X1404200513. — View Citation

Downie WW, Leatham PA, Rhind VM, Wright V, Branco JA, Anderson JA. Studies with pain rating scales. Ann Rheum Dis. 1978 Aug;37(4):378-81. doi: 10.1136/ard.37.4.378. — View Citation

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Gasanova I, Alexander JC, Estrera K, Wells J, Sunna M, Minhajuddin A, Joshi GP. Ultrasound-guided suprainguinal fascia iliaca compartment block versus periarticular infiltration for pain management after total hip arthroplasty: a randomized controlled trial. Reg Anesth Pain Med. 2019 Feb;44(2):206-211. doi: 10.1136/rapm-2018-000016. — View Citation

Iwanaga J, Simonds E, Schumacher M, Yilmaz E, Altafulla J, Tubbs RS. Anatomic Study of the Superior Cluneal Nerve and Its Related Groove on the Iliac Crest. World Neurosurg. 2019 May;125:e925-e928. doi: 10.1016/j.wneu.2019.01.210. Epub 2019 Feb 11. — View Citation

Kokar S, Ertas A, Mercan O, Yildirim FG, Tastan OA, Akgun K. The lumbar erector spinae plane block: a cadaveric study. Turk J Med Sci. 2022 Feb;52(1):229-236. doi: 10.3906/sag-2107-83. Epub 2022 Feb 22. — View Citation

Moher D, Hopewell S, Schulz KF, Montori V, Gotzsche PC, Devereaux PJ, Elbourne D, Egger M, Altman DG; CONSORT. CONSORT 2010 explanation and elaboration: updated guidelines for reporting parallel group randomised trials. Int J Surg. 2012;10(1):28-55. doi: 10.1016/j.ijsu.2011.10.001. Epub 2011 Oct 12. — View Citation

Oh SK, Lim BG, Won YJ, Lee DK, Kim SS. Analgesic efficacy of erector spinae plane block in lumbar spine surgery: A systematic review and meta-analysis. J Clin Anesth. 2022 Jun;78:110647. doi: 10.1016/j.jclinane.2022.110647. Epub 2022 Jan 11. — View Citation

Pascarella G, Costa F, Del Buono R, Pulitano R, Strumia A, Piliego C, De Quattro E, Cataldo R, Agro FE, Carassiti M; collaborators. Impact of the pericapsular nerve group (PENG) block on postoperative analgesia and functional recovery following total hip arthroplasty: a randomised, observer-masked, controlled trial. Anaesthesia. 2021 Nov;76(11):1492-1498. doi: 10.1111/anae.15536. Epub 2021 Jul 1. — View Citation

Soffin EM, Okano I, Oezel L, Arzani A, Sama AA, Cammisa FP, Girardi FP, Hughes AP. Impact of ultrasound-guided erector spinae plane block on outcomes after lumbar spinal fusion: a retrospective propensity score matched study of 242 patients. Reg Anesth Pain Med. 2022 Feb;47(2):79-86. doi: 10.1136/rapm-2021-103199. Epub 2021 Nov 17. — View Citation

Switon A, Wodka-Natkaniec E, Niedzwiedzki L, Gazdzik T, Niedzwiedzki T. Activity and Quality of Life after Total Hip Arthroplasty. Ortop Traumatol Rehabil. 2017 Oct 31;19(5):441-450. doi: 10.5604/01.3001.0010.5823. — View Citation

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Tulgar S, Ermis MN, Ozer Z. Combination of lumbar erector spinae plane block and transmuscular quadratus lumborum block for surgical anaesthesia in hemiarthroplasty for femoral neck fracture. Indian J Anaesth. 2018 Oct;62(10):802-805. doi: 10.4103/ija.IJA_230_18. — View Citation

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Zhang XY, Ma JB. The efficacy of fascia iliaca compartment block for pain control after total hip arthroplasty: a meta-analysis. J Orthop Surg Res. 2019 Jan 25;14(1):33. doi: 10.1186/s13018-018-1053-1. — View Citation

* Note: There are 21 references in all — Click here to view all references

Outcome

Type	Measure	Description	Time frame	Safety issue
Primary	Post-operative Pain Score in Numeric Rating Scale (NRS) From 0 (no Pain) to 10 (Extreme Pain)	at rest	First post-operative day
Primary	Post-operative Pain Score in Numeric Rating Scale (NRS) From 0 (no Pain) to 10 (Extreme Pain)	upon mobilisation	First post-operative day
Primary	Post-operative 12 Hour Fentanyl (Intravenous Patient-controlled Analgesia) Use	in microgram	12 hour post-operatively
Primary	Post-operative 24 Hour Fentanyl (Intravenous Patient-controlled Analgesia) Use	in microgram	24 hour post-operatively
Secondary	Post-operative Nausea and Vomiting (PONV)	either presence of nausea or vomiting of any degree counted as yes	First post-operative day
Secondary	Knee Flexion Power (Operative Side)	measured in medical research council (MRC) grade with 0 being no movement to maximum of 5 meaning normal power	First post-operative day