Combined sciatic and femoral nerve block for knee arthroscopy: 4 years' experience.

Selective block of the femoral and sciatic nerves was performed on 601 patients undergoing knee arthroscopy. The results were good in 87%, adequate in 12%, and poor in 1%. The whole knee surface was covered by the nerve blockade. The duration of anesthesia was 152 +/- 21 min and that of analgesia, was 336 +/- 18 min. No correlation was observed between the effectiveness of the anesthesia and type of surgery performed. The technique described thus proved adequate for knee arthroscopic surgery, reproducibility was excellent, costs and hospital stays were reduced with respect to general anesthesia, and surgeon and patient satisfaction was high.