Background: Acute postoperative pain after myomectomy can impair patient function. Like all other postoperative pain, it is a challenge requiring solution, particularly in developing countries. Ultrasound-guided transversus abdominis plane (TAP) block and wound infiltration (WI) are both known to be effective in managing postoperative pain. It is not certain if transversus abdominis plain block would be superior to wound infiltration. Aims: It was hypothesized that the TAP block has similar analgesic effectiveness to wound infiltration.
Subjects and methods: This study was a randomized controlled trial involving, seventy-four (74) patients scheduled for myomectomy at the University of Benin Teaching Hospital Benin City, Nigeria under the subarachnoid block, which were randomized into TAP and WI group preoperatively. The ultrasound-guided bilateral TAP block group and wound infiltration group (subfascial and subcutaneous infiltration) each used 40 mL of 0.25% of plain bupivacaine to achieve postoperative analgesia. The time to first analgesic request, numerical pain rating scale (NRS) score at rest, and movement were assessed. Data were analyzed using SPSS version 16 (Chicago Il, USA).
Results: The time to first analgesic request was significantly delayed in the TAP block group compared to the wound infiltration group [240 (131, 375) min vs 170 (128, 187) minutes. P = 0.006]. The proportions of patients with NRS score ≤3 at the time of first analgesic requests were significantly more in the TAP block group (P < 0.001). The analgesic consumed by the TAP block group was significantly low compared to the WI group. There were no incidences of complications due to TAP block or wound infiltration.
Conclusion: TAP block provided a longer duration of analgesia and a clinically superior quality of analgesia to wound infiltration.
Keywords: Ultrasound-guided TAP block; and post operative analgesia; wound infiltration.