Effect of Ultrasound Guided Thoracic Interfascial Plane Block Versus Erector Spinae Plane Block After Mastectomy

Various thoracic nerve blocks performed for pain control after breast cancer surgery provide superior analgesic effect and reduce postoperative nausea and vomiting as a result of the decreased use of opioid analgesics. Ultrasound-guided erector spinae block (ESB) is a regional anesthesia technique; recently described by Forero et al, in management of thoracic neuropathic pain. It became popular because it is much safer and easily administered than other alternative regional techniques as paravertebral and thoracic epidural block. ESB leads to effective postoperative analgesia when performed at T 4-5 level for breast and thoracic surgery, and T 7 level for abdominal surgeries. Spread of local anesthetic following ESB in the cephalic and caudal directions can lead to analgesia from C7 to L2-3. There have been several reports that thoracic interfascial plane block is useful for multimodal analgesia in patients undergoing mastectomy, Thoracic interfascial plane block including pecto-intercostal fascial plane block (PIFB) and serratus intercostal fascial plane block (SIFB). Thoracic interfascial plane block is the peripheral nerve block that targets the intercostal nerves branches distributed in the chest and axilla, Although PIFB and SIFB are thought to be relatively easy to perform there have been no reports of the simultaneous performance of the two blocks.