Effects of preoperative warming on the incidence of XXXX after clean surgery: a randomised controlled trial.

@entity1 @entity6081 @entity2080 @entity2737 @entity281 @entity547
BACKGROUND: @entity2737 after clean surgery is an expensive and often underestimated cause of @entity1 morbidity, and the benefits of using prophylactic antibiotics have not been proven. Warming @entity1 during colorectal surgery has been shown to reduce @entity281 rates. We aimed to assess whether warming @entity1 before short duration, clean surgery would have the same effect. METHODS: 421 @entity1 having clean (breast, varicose vein, or @entity547 ) surgery were randomly assigned to either a non-warmed (standard) group or one of two warmed groups (local and systemic). We applied warming for at least 30 min before surgery. @entity1 were followed up and masked outcome assessments made at 2 and 6 weeks. FINDINGS: Analysis was done on an intention-to-treat basis. We identified 19 wound infections in 139 non-warmed @entity1 (14%) but only 13 in 277 who received warming (5%; p=0.001). Wound scores were also significantly lower (p=0.007) in warmed @entity1 . There was no significant difference in the development of haematomas or @entity2080 after surgery but the non-warmed group were prescribed significantly more postoperative antibiotics (p=0.002). INTERPRETATION: Warming @entity1 before clean surgery seems to aid the prevention of @entity6081 . If applied according to the manufacturers guidelines these therapies have no known side-effects and might, with the support of further studies, provide an alternative to prophylactic antibiotics in this type of surgery.
