Conscious sedation safe for heart valve procedure: 5 study insights

A study published in PLOS ONE determined conscious sedation was a safe and viable option to general anesthesia for transcatheter aortic valve replacement.

Richard Shemin, MD, UC Los Angeles' chief of cardiac surgery, and colleagues examined 196 adult patients who had transcatheter aortic valve replacement at Ronald Reagan UC Los Angeles Medical Center between August 2012 and June 2016.

Here's what they found.

1. Patients who elected conscious sedation had similar adverse events rates as those who elected anesthesia.

2. Conscious sedation patients had shorter stays in the intensive care unit (30 hours) than those who elected general anesthesia (96 hours).

3. Conscious sedation patients also had shorter hospital stays (4.9 days) than general anesthesia patients (10.4 days).

4. Direct costs were 28 percent lower for conscious sedation patients. All other medical costs were lower as well.

5. For both patient groups, 1.5 percent died during hospitalization.

Researchers advised that a large-scale, controlled and randomized study is needed to validate findings before concluding that "transcatheter aortic valve replacement should receive conscious sedation instead of general anesthesia whenever possible."

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