Wound infiltration with ropivacaine as an adjuvant to patient controlled analgesia for transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion: a retrospective study.

BACKGROUND Surgical procedure usually causes serious postoperative pain and poor postoperative pain management negatively affects quality of life, function and recovery time. We aimed to investigate the role of wound infiltration with ropivacaine as an adjuvant to patient controlled analgesia (PCA) in postoperative pain control for patients undergoing transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion. METHODS One hundred twelve patients undergoing lumbar fusion were retrospectively reviewed and divided into two groups (ropivacaine and control groups) according to whether received wound infiltration with ropivacaine or not. Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) score, analgesics consumption, number of patients requiring rescue analgesic, hospital duration and incidence of complications were recorded. Surgical trauma was assessed using operation time, intraoperative blood loss and incision length. RESULTS The amount of sufentanil consumption in ropivacaine group at 4 h postoperatively was lower than that of control group (24.5 ± 6.0 μg vs 32.1 ± 7.0 μg, P   0.05). CONCLUSION Wound infiltration with ropivacaine effectively reduces postoperative opioid consumption and PONV and may be a useful adjuvant to PCA to improve recovery for patients undergoing lumbar spine surgery.