Pain Management in Head and Neck Surgery Patients

Head and neck surgery patients have significant difficulty with pain control and the traditional opioid pain regimens can have increased risk in this patients population (namely, respiratory and airway compromise). Most of the literature for head and neck cancer patients focuses on pain management during chemoradiation therapy, but very few studies evaluate pain management in the post-operative setting. Patients with worse pain control and chronic opioid use do not score as well on quality of life questionnaires and have higher rates of depression and anxiety. The few studies that did specifically evaluate post-operative pain showed success with a scheduled non-opioid management such as NSAIDs, acetaminophen, and gabapentin/pregabalin. In head and neck surgery patients, pre-operative gabapentin as compared to standard opioid pain medications was shown to have better pain control and less opioid requirements post operatively. Post-operative gabapentin has been studied and shows equivalent results, but has not been tested in a randomized controlled fashion and thus, more data is necessary. In another study evaluating scheduled acetaminophen vs as needed opioid pain medication in post-operative Cesarean section patients, there were similar results with improved pain control and less opioid use. NSAIDS are frequently avoided in post-surgical patients due to an increased risk of bleeding, but are frequently used in non-surgical patients and have shown significant benefit in pain control. Celecoxib is an NSAID that does not carry an increased bleeding risk and has been shown to be beneficial in pain control. The pain management team in the UAB Department of Anesthesiology currently uses a combination regimen of opioid and non-opioid medication for their post-operative patients. This is the combination we plan to use in our treatment group. It consists of the standard dosing of oxycodone (an opioid) and acetaminophen, gabapentin and celecoxib (non-opioids) and is considered routine care for Anesthesiology's post-operative patients. This study would be the first of its kind and potentially help determine a new post-operative pain management protocol for head and neck patients that is both more effective and less risky.