Age and bupivacaine plasma concentrations following radical cystectomy.

Purpose: Continuous epidural analgesia with bupivacaine for postoperative analgesia can increase its plasma concentrations. Whether this effect can be aggravated with increasing age is unknown. Therefore, bupivacaine concentrations were prospectively monitored in patients undergoing radical cystectomies.

Comparison of early postoperative morbidity after robot-assisted and open radical cystectomy: results of a prospective observational study.

Objective: To evaluate early postoperative morbidity in patients undergoing either robot-assisted (RARC) or open radical cystectomy (ORC) for bladder cancer.

Patients And Methods: A total of 100 patients underwent RARC (between August 2009 and August 2012) and 42 underwent ORC (between October 2007 and July 2009) as treatment for bladder cancer. Data on the patients' peri-operative course were collected prospectively up to the 90th postoperative day for the RARC group and up to the 60th postoperative day for the ORC group.