Background:It is not known whether modern volatile anesthetics are associated with less mortality and postoperative pulmonary or other complications in patients undergoing general anesthesia for surgery.Methods:A systematic literature review was conducted for randomized controlled trials fulfilling

Effects of volatile anesthetics on mortality and postoperative pulmonary and other complications in patients undergoing surgery: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Summary A randomised study of 414 patients undergoing coronary artery surgery with cardiopulmonary bypass was conducted to compare the effects of a volatile anaesthetic regimen with either deesflurane or sevoflurane, and a total intravenous anaesthesia (TIVA) regimen on postoperative troponin T release. The primary outcome variable was postoperative troponin T release, secondary outcome variables were hospital length of stay and 1-year mortality. Maximal postoperative troponin T values did not differ between groups (TIVA: 0.30 [0.00‐4.79] ng.ml )1 (median [range]), sevoflurane: 0.33 [0.02‐3.68] ng.ml )1 , and desflurane: 0.39 [0.08‐3.74] ng.ml )1 ). The independent predictors of hospital length of stay were the EuroSCORE (p < 0.001), female gender (p = 0.042) and the group assignment (p < 0.001). The one-year mortality was 12.3% in the TIVA group, 3.3% in the sevoflurane group, and 6.7% in the desflurane group. The EuroSCORE (p = 0.003) was the only significant independent predictor of 1-year mortality.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1365-2044.2009.06008.x

A comparison of volatile and non volatile agents for cardioprotection during on-pump coronary surgery

Anaesthetists are confronted on a daily basis with patients with coronary artery disease, myocardial ischaemia, or both during the perioperative period. Therefore, prevention and ultimately adequate therapy of perioperative myocardial ischaemia and its consequences are the major challenges in current anaesthetic practice. This review will focus on the translation of the laboratory evidence of anaesthetic-induced cardioprotection into daily clinical practice.

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Anaesthesia and myocardial ischaemia/reperfusion injury

β-blockers and volatile anesthetics may attenuate cardioprotection by remote preconditioning in adult cardiac surgery: a meta-analysis of 15 randomized trials.

Preconditioning has been shown to reduce myocardial damage caused by ischaemia-reperfusion injury peri-operatively. Volatile anaesthetic agents have the potential to provide myocardial protection by anaesthetic preconditioning and, in addition, they also mediate renal and cerebral protection. A number of proof-of-concept trials have confirmed that the experimental evidence can be translated into clinical practice with regard to postoperative markers of myocardial injury; however, this effect has not been ubiquitous. The clinical trials published to date have also been too small to investigate clinical outcome and mortality. Data from recent meta-analyses in cardiac anaesthesia are also not conclusive regarding intra-operative volatile anaesthesia. These inconclusive clinical results have led to great variability currently in the type of anaesthetic agent used during cardiac surgery. This review summarises experimentally proposed mechanisms of anaesthetic preconditioning, and assesses randomised controlled clinical trials in cardiac anaesthesia that have been aimed at translating experimental results into the clinical setting.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/anae.12975

Thomas Meemann

Papers

Impact of preconditioning protocol on anesthetic-induced cardioprotection in patients having coronary artery bypass surgery