Clinical trial NCT05029726: Regional Anesthesia in Minimally Invasive Lumbar Spine Surgery
Official title: Randomized, Placebo-controlled Trial of Erector Spinae Plane Blocks (ESPB) for Perioperative Pain Management for Minimally Invasive (MIS) Lumbar Spine Surgery
Study type: INTERVENTIONAL
Overall status: RECRUITING
Phase: PHASE4
Conditions: Lumbar Spinal Stenosis
Lumbar Disc Herniation
Lumbar Spondylolisthesis
Lumbar Spondylosis
Lumbar Radiculopathy
Lumbar Spine Instability
Synovial Cyst
Degenerative Disc Disease
Degenerative Spondylolisthesis
Degenerative Intervertebral Discs
Keywords: erector spinae plane block
minimally invasive spine surgery
regional anesthesia
randomized controlled trial
Lead sponsor: Rush University Medical Center
Sponsor class: OTHER
First posted: 2021-08-31
Enrollment: 125
Sex: ALL
Minimum age (years): 18
Maximum age (years): 80
Standard ages: ADULT
OLDER_ADULT
Accepts healthy volunteers: no
Allocation: RANDOMIZED
Intervention model: PARALLEL
Intervention model description: All patients will undergo surgery using an enhanced recovery after surgery (ERAS) multi-modal anesthesia protocol that is currently in standard use for MIS lumbar spine surgical procedures. Patients will be randomized in a 1:1 ratio to investigational and control arms.
Primary purpose: TREATMENT

Brief summary: Opioid overuse is a widespread public health crisis in the United States with increasing rates of addiction and overdose deaths from prescription opioids. Reducing the need for opiate analgesics in the post-operative setting has become a high priority in minimizing long-term opioid use in surgical patients. This study will serve to demonstrate the efficacy of the addition of regional analgesic techniques in reducing post-operative opioid requirements in patients undergoing common lumbar spinal surgical procedures.

Detailed description: Opioid abuse and misuse remain a public health crisis in the United States, notably in patients with chronic pain from degenerative spine disease. Perioperative pain management for patients undergoing spinal surgery remains largely reliant on opioid medications, with several known adverse effects including, but not limited to delirium, postoperative urinary retention (POUR), constipation and nausea. These side effects contribute to increased hospital length of stay (LOS) with increased incidence of overall in-hospital complications, perioperative costs, and increased rates of opioid habituation and addiction.

Dependence on prescription opioids has been associated with wide-ranging social and economic consequences including increased opioid overdose resulting in death, growing opioid-related incarcerations, and spiraling opioid-related healthcare cost from treatment of addiction, opioid-related mental health issues, and debilitating chronic pain. Long-term requirements for opioid medications may be associated with the use of higher doses of opioids in the perioperative period for patients undergoing invasive surgery for spinal degenerative conditions. Studies have demonstrated that patients who consume fewer opioids for 30 days after surgery are less likely to progress to become chronic opioid users. Regional analgesic techniques have shown promise in decreasing post-operative pain and opioid requirements in thoracic and abdominal surgery but difficulties with post-operative neurological assessments have limited their use in spinal surgery. Inter-fascial plane blocks, however, have emerged as a safe and potentially useful regional analgesic technique to mitigate the pain-inducing effects of posterior spine surgery.

Erector Spinae Plane Blocks (ESPBs), specifically, involve ultra-sound guided injection of local anesthetic (LA) posteriorly beneath the erector spinae muscles resulting in longitudinal and ventrolateral spread of the anesthetic into the paravertebral space where the ventral and dorsal rami of the spinal nerves are located thereby inducing a multi-level analgesic effect. Depending upon the LA used, this effect may last for 4 to 36 hours.

The proposed study will examine the efficacy of preoperative ESPBs in reducing post-operative opioid utilization and its associated complications specifically after minimally invasive (MIS) lumbar spine surgery including both decompressive and instrumented fusion procedures. The guiding principle of MIS spine surgery is reduction of iatrogenic injury by utilizing muscle dilating approaches and tubular retractors rather than conventional open, subperiosteal muscle stripping techniques. The latter typically results in muscle denervation and devascularization as well as postoperative muscle atrophy and dead space creation that increase postoperative pain, muscle dysfunction, prolonged recovery times and complications. Since MIS spinal surgical procedures preserve normal paraspinal musculature compared to open surgery, the magnitude of effect of ESPBs may actually be more pronounced in this population.

The investigators hypothesize that by conducting this investigation within the rigor of a double-blinded, randomized placebo-controlled clinical trial, the results will definitively demonstrate that the addition of regional analgesia in the form of ESPB during MIS lumbar spine surgery will 1) reduce post-operative opioid consumption and 2) reduce opioid-related complications and hospital LOS but 3) have no adverse effects on postoperative pain control.

Eligibility criteria: Inclusion Criteria:

* Age 18-80
* Undergoing one of 3 procedure types: 1) 2 or more levels of MIS decompression (e.g., discectomy, foraminotomy, laminectomy); 2) 1-3 levels of MIS transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion (TLIF) (with or without additional levels of MIS decompression for no greater than 3 total operative levels); 3) 1-3 levels of anterior lumbar interbody fusion (ALIF) or MIS lateral lumbar interbody fusion (LLIF) accompanied by posterior percutaneous instrumentation at the same levels
* Willing and able to give consent

Exclusion Criteria:

* Opioid tolerant at the time of the surgical procedure--defined as consuming greater than 30mg of morphine milligram equivalents (MME) daily (https://www.cdc.gov/drugoverdose/prescribing/guideline.html)
* Presence of an indwelling pain device (e.g., intrathecal opioid pump, spinal cord stimulator, dorsal root ganglion stimulator)
* Known allergy to bupivacaine, clonidine or similar local anesthetics
* Indication for surgery other than degenerative disease (e.g., neoplasm, infection, trauma)
* Chronic kidney disease (stage 3 or greater), or hepatic failure
* Active pregnancy
* Disease process or mental illness that would preclude accurate evaluation of pain in the perioperative period
* Active Worker's Compensation litigation

Primary outcomes:
measure: Inpatient opioid consumption
timeFrame: Every 1 day during inpatient admission up to 30 days
Secondary outcomes:
measure: Post-discharge opioid consumption
timeFrame: 14 days (+/- 7days) ,56 days (+/- 14 days) and 90 days (+/- 19) postoperatively
measure: Postoperative opioid prescriptions filled
timeFrame: From hospital discharge to 90 days postoperatively
measure: Length of hospital stay
timeFrame: From time of surgery to time discharge criteria met in hours, up to 2160 hours
measure: Postoperative Urinary Retention (POUR)
timeFrame: Immediately post-surgery to discharge, up to 90 days
measure: Post-operative delirium
timeFrame: Immediately post-surgery to discharge
measure: Post-operative delirium
timeFrame: Immediately post-surgery to discharge, up to 90 days
measure: Postoperative pain scores
timeFrame: Every 1 day during inpatient admission up to 30 days
measure: Patient-reported pain and functional outcomes
timeFrame: From baseline preoperative values to 6 week post-operative values
measure: Patient-reported pain and functional outcomes
timeFrame: From baseline preoperative values to 6 week post-operative values
measure: Patient-reported pain and functional outcomes
timeFrame: From baseline preoperative values to 6 week post-operative values
measure: Peri-operative complications
timeFrame: Time of surgery to 6 weeks postoperative
Other outcomes:
Locations:
city: Chicago
country: United States
facility: Rush University Medical Center
state: Illinois
Study officials:
affiliation: Rush University Medical Center
name: John O'Toole, MD
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
References:
citation: Chin KJ, Lewis S. Opioid-free Analgesia for Posterior Spinal Fusion Surgery Using Erector Spinae Plane (ESP) Blocks in a Multimodal Anesthetic Regimen. Spine (Phila Pa 1976). 2019 Mar 15;44(6):E379-E383. doi: 10.1097/BRS.0000000000002855.
citation: Chin KJ, Dinsmore MJ, Lewis S, Chan V. Opioid-sparing multimodal analgesia with bilateral bi-level erector spinae plane blocks in scoliosis surgery: a case report of two patients. Eur Spine J. 2020 Dec;29(Suppl 2):138-144. doi: 10.1007/s00586-019-06133-8. Epub 2019 Sep 3.
citation: Forero M, Adhikary SD, Lopez H, Tsui C, Chin KJ. The Erector Spinae Plane Block: A Novel Analgesic Technique in Thoracic Neuropathic Pain. Reg Anesth Pain Med. 2016 Sep-Oct;41(5):621-7. doi: 10.1097/AAP.0000000000000451.
citation: Melvin JP, Schrot RJ, Chu GM, Chin KJ. Low thoracic erector spinae plane block for perioperative analgesia in lumbosacral spine surgery: a case series. Can J Anaesth. 2018 Sep;65(9):1057-1065. doi: 10.1007/s12630-018-1145-8. Epub 2018 Apr 27.
citation: Singh S, Choudhary NK, Lalin D, Verma VK. Bilateral Ultrasound-guided Erector Spinae Plane Block for Postoperative Analgesia in Lumbar Spine Surgery: A Randomized Control Trial. J Neurosurg Anesthesiol. 2020 Oct;32(4):330-334. doi: 10.1097/ANA.0000000000000603.
citation: Ueshima H, Inagaki M, Toyone T, Otake H. Efficacy of the Erector Spinae Plane Block for Lumbar Spinal Surgery: A Retrospective Study. Asian Spine J. 2019 Apr;13(2):254-257. doi: 10.31616/asj.2018.0114. Epub 2018 Nov 15.
citation: van den Broek RJC, van de Geer R, Schepel NC, Liu WY, Bouwman RA, Versyck B. Evaluation of adding the Erector spinae plane block to standard anesthetic care in patients undergoing posterior lumbar interbody fusion surgery. Sci Rep. 2021 Apr 7;11(1):7631. doi: 10.1038/s41598-021-87374-w.
citation: Armaghani SJ, Lee DS, Bible JE, Archer KR, Shau DN, Kay H, Zhang C, McGirt MJ, Devin CJ. Preoperative opioid use and its association with perioperative opioid demand and postoperative opioid independence in patients undergoing spine surgery. Spine (Phila Pa 1976). 2014 Dec 1;39(25):E1524-30. doi: 10.1097/BRS.0000000000000622.
citation: Kalakoti P, Hendrickson NR, Bedard NA, Pugely AJ. Opioid Utilization Following Lumbar Arthrodesis: Trends and Factors Associated With Long-term Use. Spine (Phila Pa 1976). 2018 Sep 1;43(17):1208-1216. doi: 10.1097/BRS.0000000000002734.