Ultrasonido para la valoración del contenido gástrico: revisión sistemática de la literatura

Abstract

Pneumonic aspiration of gastric contents is an important complication of anesthetic practice. : To determine the applicability of ultrasound for the assessment of the qualitative and quantitative characteristics of gastric contents. : A systematic review was carried out, based on a structured search of the literature published in the databases: Pubmed, EMBASE, SciELO, Cochrane Library, OVID and Google Scholar, from the foundation of these until December 2018 Boolean connectors were used to locate information from the terms: anesthesiology, ultrasonography, gastrointestinal Contents. The quality of the information was assessed using different tools according to each type of study. : We found 23 relevant studies for inclusion in the systematic review. The overall risk of bias was low. : Gastric ultrasound seems to correspond to a tool that is easy to perform at the patient’s bedside, but there is uncertainty about its applicability in uncontrolled settings, different from those applied in the studies described in this review. More research is needed with different populations and scenarios, in favor of establishing the behavior in these, of the variables that can be determined by ultrasound. The implications for clinical practice and long-term outcomes may have the measurements achieved by ultrasound are still uncertain.