Comparison of Ultrasound Guided Caudal Block and Ultrasound Guided Pericapsular Nerve Group Block for Pediatric Hip Surgery

Surgical repair of the hip can be extremely painful and is associated with considerable postoperative pain in children despite the use of systemic opioids. These patients may benefit from neuraxial analgesia in adjunction with general anesthesia. The reported advantages of this technique include decreased opiate exposure, decreased time in the post-anesthesia recovery room, decreased hospital stay, reduce the post-operative morbidity, provide early mobilization. (1,2) Single shot caudal block has been the widely used to provide intraoperative and postoperative analgesia especially in pediatric surgery below the umbilical level, by block the region between T10 and S5 dermatomes. (3,4) The success rate of classic caudal epidural anesthesia method in pediatric patients has been reported to be about 75%. (5) Because there are many anatomical variations have been reported for sacral hiatus and sacral cornua. Ultrasound guided caudal block has many advantages as it is helpful for visualization of the sacral hiatus, sacrococcygeal ligament, epidural space and the distribution of the local anesthetic agent within the epidural space. So, the success rate of caudal block is increase (6) However caudal block has adverse effects such as hypotension, postoperative nausea, vomiting, urinary retention, excessive motor block, and pruritus that limit the use of caudal block in children. (7) Regional anesthetic techniques seem to be a better choice for improving acute pain management in these patients, with fewer adverse effects. Pericapsular nerve group (PENG) block has been recently recommended by Girón-Arango et al. for use as postoperative analgesia in hip surgeries (8) It is a new regional anesthesia method in the region between the anterior inferior iliac spine (AIIS) and ilio-pubic eminence (IPE). The anterior capsule is the most richly innervated section of the joint suggesting these nerves should be the main targets for hip analgesia. (9) To the best of our knowledge, there are no previously published data comparing the pericapsular nerve group (PENG) block with caudal block techniques.