Gastrointestinal motility following thoracic surgery: the effect of thoracic epidural analgesia. A randomised controlled trial.

Backgrounds: Impairment of gastrointestinal (GI) motility is an undesirable but inevitable consequence of surgery. This prospective randomised controlled study tested the hypothesis that postoperative thoracic epidural analgesia (TEA) with ropivacaine or a combination of ropivacaine and morphine accelerates postoperative GI function and shortens the duration of postoperative ileus following major thoracic surgery compared to intravenous (IV) morphine.

Methods: Thirty patients scheduled for major thoracic surgery were randomised to three groups.