AN APPRAISAL OF ANAESTHESIA FOR ABDOMINAL MYOMECTOMY IN A TERTIARY INSTITUTION NORTH CENTRAL NIGERIA.

Background Abdominal myomectomy is a common gynaecological surgical procedure in our institution. Objective A retrospective study of the various types of anaesthetic techniques used and the immediate post-operative/anaesthetic complications following an open abdominal myomectomy. Methods This was a cross-sectional study of all open abdominal myomectomies performed from 1st January 2016 to 31st December 2019. Data were analysed using Chi-square and Fisher's exact test as appropriate using SPSS (IBM SPSS Statistics version 22.0 Armonk, NY IBM Corp). A p-value of ˂ 0.05 was taken to be significant. Results Two hundred open myomectomies were suitable for analysis. The age range was between 21-63 years and most of the patients were ASA I 102(51.0%). Most of the surgeries were performed under regional anaesthesia (RA) 130(65.0%) and 56(28.0%) under general anaesthesia (GA) with 14(7.0%) converted from RA to GA. The predominant RA used was epidural anaesthesia 56(28.0%). Most of the patients who had an estimated blood loss of greater than 2000mls 15(71.4) had GA p=0.000. Only one patient 1(0.5%) had an intraoperative critical incidence. Conclusion Regional anaesthesia for open myomectomy is high in our institution with a very good outcome. Keywords: Fibroids, Abdominal myomectomy, Anaesthesia techniques, Complications