Fascia Iliaca Compartment Block for Proximal-end Femur Fractures

Overview

Fracture femur is a common injury which is associated with excruciating pain. Positioning for neuraxial blocks is always challenging because even slight overriding of the fracture ends is intensely painful .It can causing major patient distress which accompanied by well-known physiological sequelae such as sympathetic activation causing tachycardia, hypotension, and increased cardiac work that may compromise high-risk cardiac patients. Fascia iliaca compartment block is highly effective in blocking lateral cutaneous nerve of the thigh and femoral nerve. Fascia iliaca compartment block is not only easy to perform but it is also associated with minimal risk as the local anesthetic is injected at a safe distance from the femoral artery and femoral nerve. It is always safe to perform the fascia iliaca compartment block prior to spinal anesthesia as the patient can respond during administration of the local anesthetic and can prevent intra-neuronal injections

On arrival to the pre-operative holding area half hour before the scheduled surgery. Patient will be connected to basal monitoring devices; pulse oximetry and non- invasive blood pressure. Fascia iliaca compartment block will be performed with the aid of ultrasound device in all cases.The injected local anesthetic solution will be prepared by a staff member who was not involved in the study) according to the randomization. After 20 minutes from the injection the investigators will assessed nerves that had been blocked. On arrival to the operative theater, under complete aseptic technique spinal anesthesia will be carried out in the sitting position (if there is severe pain at positioning we will use lateral position) at space between L3-4 or L4-5 using a 25-gauge spinal quincke needle. After feeling the desired space, the needle will be advanced (paramedian approach) till free flow of cerebrospinal fluid dropped from the needle then 15 mg hyperbaric bupivacaine+20mic fentanyl will be injected.