Small Animal Surgery Resident Texas A&M College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences College Station, Texas
We hypothesized bupivacaine liposome (Nocita) would decrease need for rescue analgesia in dogs undergoing soft tissue surgeries. We also hypothesized there would be no increased incidence of incision site complications associated with the peri-incisional injection of Nocita. Eighty-three client-owned dogs were enrolled in a randomized, blinded, placebo-controlled clinical study for dogs undergoing a variety of soft tissue surgical procedures. Immediately post-op, an injection of a placebo (0.9% saline) or Nocita was administered into the peri-incisional subcutaneous tissues. Pain was objectively assessed via the Glasgow Composite Measure Pain Scale (CMPS-SF) pre-operatively, immediately post-operatively, and at standardized time points up to 72 hours post-operatively, or time of discharge, whichever came first. Incision site complications and surgical site infections were recorded. There was no significant difference in need for additional intravenous opioids post-operatively or in incision site complications between the two groups. Limitations of this study include the concurrent use of locoregional nerve blocks, constant rate infusions of opioid medications post-operatively, and individual variation in post-operative analgesic protocols. Nocita did not significantly decrease use of rescue analgesia for post-operative soft tissue surgeries in the clinical setting of multimodal analgesia. Nocita may still be beneficial where multimodal analgesic protocols are not routine or are not available.
