Dexmedetomidine as an Additive to Local Anaesthesia to Decrease Intraocular Pressure in Glaucoma Surgery

Overview

Nowadays, a number of cases with increased intraocular pressure and glaucoma have been shown a huge increase . This is because of the increase the geriatric population in the community and advanced medical care. Surgical correction, as a treatment, solves this problem greatly especially with the modern surgical techniques . Peribulbar block reduced the admission discharge time and reduced the burden on both the patients and the medical team. On the other hand, it carries the risk of increased intraocular pressure (IOP). Which, subsequently, limit its usage in glaucoma surgery. Dexmedetomidine, as an alpha 2 agonist, has a well-established role in decreasing intraocular pressure (IOP). This effect has been shown at a histological level and clinical level

Nowadays, number of cases with increased intraocular pressure and glaucoma has been shown a huge increase . This is because of the increase the geriatric population in the community and advanced medical care. Surgical correction, as a treatment, solves this problem greatly especially with the modern surgical techniques . Peribulbar block reduced the admission discharge time and reduced the burden on both the patients and the medical team. On the other hand, it carries the risk of increased intraocular pressure (IOP). Which, subsequently, limit its usage in glaucoma surgery . Dexmedetomidine, as an alpha 2 agonist, has a well established role in decreasing intraocular pressure (IOP). This effect has been shown at a histological level and clinical level . It has been tested in many studies before as an additive to local anaesthetic to augment the effect of the block and to achieve an accepted level of patient sedation (\*\*). Many routes have been tested such as intravenous infusion, intramuscular injection and topically with the local anaesthesia . There is a debate about the best route and the optimum dose that can achieve the desired clinical effect with the least side effects. There is no study, till now, has examined the effect of Dexmedetomidine in a diseased eye with pathology that leads to increased IOP. This study states the hypothesis that Dexmedetomidine locally as an additive to local anaesthesia in different doses, not only will increase the duration of the block or achieve some level of sedation, but also can reduce the IOP in this diseased eye to a level that will help the surgical conditions and improve the surgical outcome.