Patient-Controlled Epidural Analgesia (PCEA) for Patients Who Have Had Major Open Gynecologic Surgery
Status:
Completed
Trial end date:
2007-07-01
Target enrollment:
Participant gender:
Summary
Recovery after major abdominal surgery can be longer than other types of surgery. This is
because often after abdominal surgery, the bowel does not work normally. When this happens,
patients are unable to pass gas. This can lead to bloating, pain, nausea and vomiting. These
symptoms are called postoperative ileus.
We, the researchers at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC), are doing this study
to compare two methods of treating pain during and after major gynecological surgery. The two
methods are called patient-controlled epidural analgesia (PCEA) and patient-controlled
intravenous analgesia (PCA). PCA is the standard of care for women having major gynecological
surgery. We are going to compare PCEA to PCA to see if PCEA will improve recovery after major
gynecologic surgery.
PCEA is a well established method used to ease pain in many settings such as during
childbirth and bowel surgery. There have been several studies showing that PCEA is as good as
and sometimes better for pain relief than PCA. PCEA may help the bowel work better by
preventing ileus after surgery. However, this has never been looked at in women having major
gynecologic surgery. This study will also look at whether preventing this ileus will lead to
patients going home or returning to regular activities sooner.