Abstract

Long-term sustainability of clinical practice changes in anesthesia has not been previously reported. Therefore, we performed a 5-year audit following implementation of a clinical pathway change to favor spinal anesthesia for total knee arthroplasty (TKA). We similarly evaluated a parallel cohort of patients undergoing total hip arthroplasty (THA) which did not undergo clinical pathway change as well as the utilization of regional analgesia.We identified all primary unilateral TKA and THA cases performed from January 2013 through December 2018 to include data from one-year pre-implementation and 5-years post-implementation of the clinical pathway change. Our primary outcome was the overall rate of spinal anesthesia usage. Secondary outcomes included rate of nerve block utilization, 30-day postoperative complications, and resource utilization variables such as hospital readmission, emergency department visits, and blood transfusions.The sample consisted of 1859 cases (1250 TKAs, 609 THAs). In the first year post-implementation, 174/221 (78.7%) TKAs received spinal anesthesia compared to 23/186 (12.4%) in the year before implementation (p<0.001). In the subsequent 4-year period, 647/843 (77.2%) TKAs received spinal anesthesia (p=0.532 vs. year 1). For THA, 78/124 (62.9%) received spinal anesthesia in the year after implementation compared to 48/116 (41.4%) pre-implementation (p=0.001), but this rate decreased in the subsequent 4-year period to 193/369 (52.3%) (p=0.040 vs. year 1). Utilization of regional analgesia was high in both groups, and there were no differences in other outcomes.A clinical pathway change promoting spinal anesthesia for TKA can be effectively implemented and sustained over a 5-year period.

View details for DOI 10.4097/kja.19400

View details for PubMedID 31865661