Perioperative hypothermia incidence: Where are we after 5 years?

Abstract

Objective: Inadvertent perioperative hypothermia is an important problem leading to mortality and morbidity in anesthesia practice. In order to prevent hypothermia, many precautions should be taken such as perioperative temperature monitoring, active heating and regulation of room temperatures. In a previous study performed in our clinic, the incidence of hypothermia was found to be 45.7% and the precautions that should be taken to reduce the incidence of inadvertent hypothermia in the future were determined. In this study, we aimed to determine the incidence of hypothermia in our clinic by measuring postoperative body temperatures of the patients and how effective are the methods used in preventing perioperative hypothermia. Method: After obtaining ethics committee approval and written consent from the patients, cases with operation times longer than 30 minutes were included in the study within a 1 month period. Demographic data of the patients, type and duration of surgeries, heating methods in the perioperative period, presence of temperature monitoring, pre-postoperative body temperatures measured with an infrared thermometer from tympanic membranes of the patients were recorded. Hypothermia was defined as a body temperature of less than 36°C. The incidence of hypothermia and the frequency of heating methods and monitoring were calculated. Results: A total of 793 patients were recruited (461 female, 332 male) aged between 1 month and 96 years (mean 42±22.3). Incidence of hypothermia was found as 31.27%. A total of 475 (59.89%) patients who were actively heated during the operation were recorded. The temperature monitoring rate was 9%. Conclusion: This study showed that the incidence of inadvertent perioperative hypothermia in our clinic decreased compared to our previous study. However, we think that further precautions should be taken.