What is the minimum effective anesthetic volume (MEAV90) of 0.2% ropivacaine required for ultrasound-guided popliteal-sciatic nerve block?

Background And Aims: Popliteal-Sciatic nerve block under Ultrasound Guidance (USG) using a local anesthetic agent like Ropivacaine is an established technique for providing analgesia and muscle relaxation for lower limb surgeries with minimal untoward events. Establishing the minimal volume of 0.2% ropivacaine required to provide intraoperative and postoperative analgesia will further reduce the drug requirements and adverse effects toward the patient.

Prospective evaluation of intravascular volume status in critically ill patients: does inferior vena cava collapsibility correlate with central venous pressure?

Background: In search of a standardized noninvasive assessment of intravascular volume status, we prospectively compared the sonographic inferior vena cava collapsibility index (IVC-CI) and central venous pressures (CVPs). Our goals included the determination of CVP behavior across clinically relevant IVC-CI ranges, examination of unitary behavior of IVC-CI with changes in CVP, and estimation of the effect of positive end-expiratory pressure (PEEP) on the IVC-CI/CVP relationship.

Methods: Prospective, observational study was performed in surgical/medical intensive care unit patients between October 2009 and July 2013.

Anaesthetic management in patients with glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase deficiency undergoing neurosurgical procedures.

Glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G-6-PD) deficiency is an X-linked recessive enzymopathy responsible for acute haemolysis following exposure to oxidative stress. Drugs which induce haemolysis in these patients are often used in anaesthesia and perioperative pain management. Neurosurgery and few drugs routinely used during these procedures are known to cause stress situations.

Refractory hypotension due to intraoperative hypothermia during spinal instrumentation.

We report a case of inadvertent hypothermia leading to severe hypotension resistant to high dose vasopressors, which responded to temperature correction in a patient undergoing spinal instrumentation surgery. A 60-year-old female developed severe hypotension during spinal instrumentation surgery. After review of all factors it was found to be secondary to hypothermia.

Posterior fossa dermoid: yet another cause of difficult airway?

Klippel-Feil syndrome and craniovertebral junction anomalies are known to pose challenges while the airway is being secured. These anomalies may occur in association with dermoid and epidermoid cysts in the posterior fossa. We present a case of posterior fossa dermoid with extracranial extension that caused severely restricted neck movement.