• Cheol Lee, Juhwan Lee, Gilho Lee, Hayeong Lee, Zhou Shicheng, and Jihyo Hwang.
• Department of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine, Wonkwang University School of Medicine, Iksan, South Korea.
• Psychopharmacology (Berl.). 2018 Aug 1; 235 (8): 2417-2422.

BackgroundIt has been known that anesthetic adjuvants such as dexamethasone or ketamine might change mood. This study aimed to investigate the effects of a single dose of each drug individually along with their combined usage on postoperative mood changes in patients undergoing gynecologic surgery.MethodsTwo hundred ninety-seven patients randomly allocated were divided into three groups. Group K (n = 99) received a single dose of ketamine (0.5 mg/kg iv); group D (n = 99) received a single dose of dexamethasone (0.1 mg/kg iv), and group KD (n = 99) received both ketamine (0.5 mg/kg iv) and dexamethasone (0.1 mg/kg iv) at 5 min after the induction of anesthesia. A change in the patient health questionnaire (PHQ)-9 scores on the first and third day after surgery, the duration of anesthesia, the postoperative visual analog scale (VAS) for pain, and the patient controlled analgesia (PCA) consumption were evaluated.ResultsGroups K and KD showed a significant reduction in PHQ-9 score on both the first and third day after surgery compared with those recorded preoperatively and in group D (P < 0.01). There were no differences in the group D PHQ-9 scores pre- and post-operatively. The VAS for pain 24 h after surgery and the PCA consumption in group KD decreased significantly compared to the other two groups (P < 0.05).ConclusionsA single dose of ketamine (0.5 mg/kg) with or without combination with dexamethasone (0.1 mg/kg) give iv 5 min after induction of general anesthetic produced significant improvement in the postoperative mood scores. A single intravenous dose of dexamethasone (0.1 mg/kg) alone did not change postoperative mood scores. The VAS for pain 24 h after surgery and the PCA consumption was significantly lower in patients who received combination of both drugs.

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