• Takuo Hoshi and Makoto Tanaka.
• Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine, Ibaraki Clinical Education and Training Center, Graduate School of Comprehensive Human Sciences, University of Tsukuba, Kasama 309-1793.
• Masui. 2011 Jul 1;60(7):876-9.

BackgroundEffect of epidural anesthesia is affected by catheter tip position. Migration of an epidural catheter is known and several methods were reported to secure fixation of the catheter, but there were no gold standard method to fix it.MethodsWe compared six different methods to fix the epidural catheter with Tegaderm transparent film dressing. Three groups employed forming circular loop at the skin exit site and other three groups employed directing straight up to the right shoulder. Each group was divided into three subgroups by position and use of record label of Tegaderm transparent film dressing. Epidural catheter migration was recorded for two postoperative days. We compared the magnitude of catheter movement in two days and changes in length of catheter insertion in two days for each group.ResultsThe magnitude of catheter movement is smaller in the group without circular loop formed at skin exit but all these three subgroups showed significant outward migration in two days.ConclusionsWe conclude that fixation of epidural catheter by only Tegaderm can not be a gold standard even if circular loop and record label are used.

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