Principal component analysis of event-related cerebral potentials to mechanical and electrical stimulation in man Electroenceph. clin. Neurophysiol., 53 (1982) 94–103

Epidurai morphine for postoperative analgesia: a double-blind study. E. Lanz, D. Theiss, W. Reiss and U. Sommer, Anesth. Analg. Curr. Res., 61 (1982) 236-240. Recent reports have indicated that excellent pain control can be achieved with opiates without the classical side effects of nausea, mental clouding and mood alteration by epidural administration. In this study postoperative analgesia and the side effects of epidurally injected morphine were investigated in a double-blind study. In a randomized, double-blind fashion 174 patients received either 0.1 mg/kg of morphine epidurally, 0. I mg/kg of morphine intramuscularly, or saline epidurally at the end of orthopedic surgery performed with lumbar epidural anesthesia. Following epidural morphine, postoperative pain was less frequent, less intense and of shorter duration, use of sedatives and analgesics was less frequent, and the postoperative feeling of well being was rated better than after systemic morphine or epidural saline. These effects were more frequent when bupivacaine was used for operative epidural anesthesia than when mepivacaine was employed. Side effects following epidural morphine included pruritus and disturbances of micturition. Nausea, vomiting, fatigue and headache were of comparable frequency in the three groups, and the results were independent of age.