Abstract

RIVERA DIAZ, Roberto Carlo; ARCILA LOTERO, Mario Andrés  and  GIRALDO GIRALDO, Deisy Johana. Ultrasound-guided tricompartmental blockade of the shoulder. Rev. colomb. anestesiol. [online]. 2013, vol.41, n.4, pp.245-249. ISSN 0120-3347.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rca.2013.06.003.

Introduction:Chronic shoulder pain is one of the most frequent causes of consultation for musculoskeletal pain. Physical and drug therapy usually result in little improvement and surgical intervention commonly fails. Tricompartmental blockade of the shoulder is an option when baseline therapy fails and ultrasonography is a tool that facilitates the approach, improves the efficacy and reduces the complications. Objective: To determine the efficacy and safety of ultrasound-guided tricompartmental bloc-kade of the shoulder in chronic pain patients. Methods and materials: A descriptive, prospective, follow-up study was made of a cohort of 19 patients with chronic shoulder pain receiving ultrasound-guided tricompartmental blockade of the shoulder. Data were collected prior to the procedure with four, eight and sixteen week controls. Pain intensity was measured with the visual analog scale. Results: Average age was 58.89 years, 73.7% were females. All patients referred severe pain prior to the block. The percentage of patients with reduced pain in the four follow-up periods was 78.3%. Conclusions:Chronic shoulder pain considerably affects the quality of life. Tricompartmental blockade of the shoulder is an alternative when drug therapy fails, with good outcomes, although the scientific evidence is very scarce. In our study the ultrasound-guided tricompartmental blockade of the shoulder is an effective and safe technique.

Keywords : Chronic pain; Nerve Block; Ultrasonography; Fluoroscopy; Anesthesia.

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