• F Mégret, V Perrier, C Fleureau, A Germain, A Dewitte, H Rozé, and A Ouattara.
• Service d'anesthésie-réanimation II, hôpital du Haut-Lévêque, CHU de Bordeaux, avenue Magellan, 3300 Bordeaux, France.
• Ann Fr Anesth Reanim. 2012 Oct 1;31(10):788-92.

ObjectiveEvaluate the changes in potassium following rapid sequence induction with succinylcholine in critically ill-patients and determine whether hospital length of stay could influence the succinylcholine-induced hyperkaliemia.Study DesignProspective and observational study.Patients And MethodsAfter approval by our local ethical committee, we prospectively included 36 patients admitted from more than 24hours in ICU and who required succinylcholine for rapid tracheal intubation (1mg/kg). Serum potassium was measured before, 5 and 30min after succinylcholine. The incidence of life-threatening hyperkaliemia (≥6.5mmol/L) was noted.ResultsWe could observe significant and transient increase in serum potassium (median increase of 0.45 [0.20-0.80] mmol/L at five minutes). A significant relationship was observed between the ICU length of stay and arterial potassium increase (r=0.37, P<0.05). From the ROC curve, a threshold of 12 days had an 86% sensitivity and 69% specificity in discriminating patients in whom the potassium increase was more than 1.5mmol/L.ConclusionInduction with succinylcholine is followed by significant but transient hyperkaliema. The ICU length of stay before giving succinylcholine could influence significantly the amplitude of potassium increase.Copyright © 2012 Société française d’anesthésie et de réanimation (Sfar). Published by Elsevier SAS. All rights reserved.

22 keywords...

hide…