Clinical efficacy of continuous femoral nerve block in the short term multimodal analgesia management after total knee arthroplasty for the first time

Abstract:

Objective：To compare the analgesic effects between continuous femoral nerve block（CFNB） plus multimodal analgesia （experimental group） and normal multimodal pain controlled analgesia（control group） after total knee arthroplasty for the first time and to evaluate the knee function with six months’follow-up. Methods：From October 2011 to October 2012，48 patients undergoing unilateral total knee arthroplasty were randomly devided into experimental group and control group，24 cases for each group. Two postoperative analgesia methods were applied in two groups respectively and general anesthesia was used in both group. In the periop－erative period，rest，passive and initiative visual analogue scales were used to evaluate perioperative pain. The range of motion（ROM） and complications were observed and recorded. All patients were followed up for 6 months and knee society scoring system was used to assess knee function. Results：All index indicated that analgesia effect was more obvious in experiment group than in control group within 2 d after opertion. There was no significant difference in adverse reactions and ROM at 6 months after the operation（P ＞0.05）. Conclusion：CFNB combined with multimodal analgesia can alleviate the early pain for patients undergoing total knee arthroplasty，especially at 48 hours after operation without increasing adverse reactions． Therefore，it should be considered a better analgesia method for patients after total knee arthroplasty．