Nursing in critical care
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Nursing in critical care · Sep 2003
An audit of post-operative nausea and vomiting, following cardiac surgery: scope of the problem.
Post-operative nausea and vomiting is a major problem for patients following cardiac surgery. The literature in this area identifies that there are a number of individual patient and post-operative factors which increase the risk of post-operative nausea and vomiting, including female gender, non-smoker, age, use of opioids, pain and anxiety. An audit involving 200 patients, who had undergone cardiac surgery was implemented to assess/evaluate the incidence of nausea and vomiting for this patient group. ⋯ The results suggest that nausea and vomiting, is experienced by a large number of patients after cardiac surgery (67%), with the majority suffering on the first day after surgery. The duration of nausea and vomiting for most is short, but for a significant number (7%) it can last up to one-quarter of their initial post-operative course. The paper discusses key implications for practice arising from this project.