Comparison of the Cost and Efficacy of Axillary Anesthesia and Wide-Awake Anesthesia in Finger Surgeries

OBJECTIVES: Wide-awake anesthesia is a type of local anesthesia consisting of a combined application of lidocaine, epinephrine, and bicarbonate and has a wide potential in hand surgery as it offers the advantage of being applied without sedation and without using a tourniquet. In light of recent studies, its use has increased with the disappearance of the belief among surgeons that epinephrine can cause circulatory disturbance in fingers. METHODS: Patients with finger pathologies who were operated upon at the Baltalimani Bone Diseases Teaching and Research Hospital between January 2015 and February 2016 were divided into two groups according to anesthesia type: wide-awake anesthesia and axillary block anesthesia, with 52 patients in each group. Start time of surgery, length of hospital stay, anesthesia cost, and patient satisfaction were compared. For the evaluation of patient satisfaction, the patients were postoperatively asked whether they would accept the same anesthesia method if they had to have the same experience. Each group was further divided into two subgroups: bone interventions (phalangeal fracture, bone biopsy, implant removal, and interphalangeal joint arthrodesis) and soft tissue interventions (digital nerve repair, fingertip local skin flap, flap division, releasing stiff joint, ligament repair, and debridment). Each subgroup included 26 patients. RESULTS: Sufficient anesthesia to cover the whole duration of surgery was achieved in both the groups. Regarding the question “If you were experiencing the same experience, would you accept the same anesthesia again?” 26 and 33 patients responded positively, 16 and 7 patients repsonded negatively, and 10 and 12 patients remained neutral in the axillary block and wide-awake anesthesia groups, respectively. According to the Social Security Institution data, the average anesthesia cost was 316.1 TL in the axillary block anesthesia group and 25.3 TL in the wide-awake anesthesia group; the average length of hospital stay was 32.9 h in the former and 13.6 h in the latter. Start time of surgery was 34 minutes in axillary block anesthesia and 5.3 minutes in wide-awake anesthesia. CONCLUSION: We found that compared with axillary block anesthesia, the length of hospital stay was 19.3 h less and anesthesia cost was 290.8 TL less with wide-awake anesthesia; furthermore, the start time of surgery decreased by 29.7 min with the latter. Moreover, patient satisfaction rate was better in the wide-awake anesthesia group. No bleeding, patient incompatibility, and other complications that might interfere with the surgery were detected .