Effectiveness of local anaesthetic pain catheters for abdominal donor site analgesia in patients undergoing free lower abdominal flap breast reconstruction: A meta-analysis of comparative studies.

The use of an infusion pain pump with local wound catheters has increased among different surgical specialities. Autologous breast reconstruction with deep inferior epigastric perforator (DIEP) and transverse rectus abdominis myocutaneous (TRAM) flaps may cause severe abdominal donor site morbidity, and infusion devices delivering local anaesthetic are suggested to improve postoperative analgesia. This study performed a meta-analysis comparing pain pump use vs control to evaluate this issue. A systematic literature search was performed. Primary outcome was the amount of opioid use. Secondary outcomes were the amount of antiemetic drugs and the length of hospital stay. Five studies involving 248 patients were retrieved and included in the present analysis. A significantly decreased use of opioids was observed after using pain pump vs control (MD = -15.13, 95% CI = -24.20, -6.06, p = 0.001). Although not statistically significant, the pooled results showed a trend toward reduction of antiemetic medicament use (MD = -0.71, 95% CI = -2.14, 0.72, p = 0.33) and hospital stay time (MD = -0.53, 95% CI = -1.18, 0.11, p = 0.10). The use of local anaesthetic pain catheters for abdominal donor sites in microsurgical breast reconstruction might be associated with a decreased use of narcotics and antiemetic medicaments and shorter hospital stay. Further studies are needed to validate this promising treatment modality.