All posts by The Trauma Pro

Complications, Thorax

Retained Hemothorax Part 1: Lytics

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In my last pair of posts, we reviewed chest tube management. Now let’s dive into hemothorax. This gets a little complicated, because a chest tube doesn’t always do what it’s supposed to when it comes to blood and possible blood clots.

Hemothorax is a common complication of chest trauma, occurring in about one third of cases. It is commonly treated with a chest tube, which usually takes care of the problem. But in a few cases some blood remains, which can result in an entrapped lung or empyema.

There are several management options. Historically, these patients underwent thoracotomy to peel out the fibrinous collection stuck to lung and chest wall. This has given way to the more humane VATS procedure (video assisted thoracoscopic surgery) which accomplishes the same thing using a scope. In some cases, another tube can be inserted, sometimes under CT guidance, to try to drain the blood.

So what about lytics? It’s fibrin, right? So why not just dissolve it with tissue plasminogen activator (tPA)? There have been very few studies published over the years. The most recent was in 2014. I’ll review it today, and another tomorrow. Finally, I’ll give you my thoughts on the best way to deal with retained hemothorax.

Here are the factoids:

  • This was a single center, retrospective review of data from 1.5 years beginning in 2009
  • A total of seven patients were identified, and most had hemothorax due to rib fractures. Three presented immediately after their injury, 4 were delayed.
  • Median time from injury to chest tube placement was 11 days
  • Median time the chest tube was in place was 13 days, with an average hospital stay of 14 days
  • Patients received 1 to 5 treatments, averaging 24mg per dose
  • There was one death in the group, unrelated to TPA treatment
  • No patient “required” VATS, but one underwent thoracotomy, which turned out to be for a malignancy

Bottom line: The authors conclude that tPA use for busting retained hemothorax is both safe and effective. Really? With only seven patients? The biggest problem with this study is that it uses old, retrospective data. We have no idea why these patients were selected for tPA in this 5-year old cohort of patients. Why did it take so long to put in chest tubes? Why did the chest tubes stay in so long? Maybe this is why they were in the hospital so long?

Plus, tPA is expensive. A 100mg vial runs about $6000. Does repeatedly using an expensive drug and keeping a patient in the hospital an extra week or so make financial sense? So it better work damn well, and this small series doesn’t demonstrate that.

Tomorrow, I’ll look at the next most recent paper on the topic, from way back in 2004.

Reference: Evaluation of chest tube administration of tissue plasminogen activator to treat retained hemothorax. Am J Surg 267(6):960-963, 2014.

Thorax

Practice Guideline: Chest Tube Management (Part 2)

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In my last post, I went over the rationale for developing a practice guideline for something as simple and lowly as chest tube management. Today, I’m posting the details of the guideline that’t been in use at my hospital for the past 15 years. I’ve updated it to reflect two lessons learned from actually using it.

Here’s an image of the practice guideline. Click to open a full-size copy in a new window:

Here are some key points:

  • Note the decision tree format. This eliminates uncertainty so that the clinician can stick to the script. There are no hedge words like “consider” used. Just real verbs.
  • We found that hospital length of stay improved when we changed the three parameters from daily monitoring to three consecutive shifts. We are prepared to pull the tube on any shift, not just during the day time. And it also allows this part of the guideline to be nursing driven. They remind the surgeons that criteria are met so we can immediately remove the tube.
  • Water seal is only used if there was an air leak at some point. This allows us to detect a slow ongoing leak that may not be present during our brief inspection of the system on rounds.
  • The American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma expects trauma centers to monitor compliance with at least some of their guidelines. This one makes it easy for a PI nurse or other personnel to do so.
  • The first of the “new” parts of this guideline is: putting a 7 day cap on failure due to tube output greater than 150cc per three shifts. At that point, the infectious risks of keeping a tube in begin to outweigh its efficacy. Typically, a small effusion may appear the day following removal, then resolves shortly.
  • The second “new” part is moving to VATS early if it is clear that there is visible hemothorax that is not being drained by the system. Some centers may want to try irrigation or lytics, but the data for this is not great. I’ll republish my posts on this over the next two days.

Click here to download a copy of this practice guideline for adults.

Click here to download the pediatric chest tube practice guideline.

Thorax

Practice Guideline: Chest Tube Management (Part 1)

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I’m devoting the next series of posts to revisiting the management of hemo- and/or pneumothorax. These clinical issues are some of the most common sources of variability in how trauma professionals approach them. Let’s start with the seemingly simple chore of managing a lowly chest tube.

Management of chest tubes is one of those clinical situations that are just perfect for practice guideline development: commonly encountered, with lots of variability between trauma professionals. There are lots of potential areas for variation:

  • How long should the tube stay in?
  • What criteria should be used to determine when to pull it?
  • Water seal or no?
  • When should followup x-rays be done?

Every one of these questions will have a very real impact on that patient’s length of stay and potential for complications.

We developed a chest tube clinical practice guideline (CPG) at Regions Hospital way back in 2004! Of course, there was little literature available to guide us in answering the questions listed above. So we had to use the clinical experience and judgment of the trauma faculty to settle on a protocol that all were comfortable with.

Ultimately, we answered the questions like this:

  • The tube stays in until three specific criteria are met
  • The criteria are: <150 cc drainage over 3 shifts, no air leak, and no residual pneumothorax (or at least a small, stable one)
  • Use of water seal is predicated on whether there was ever an air leak
  • An x-ray is obtained to determine whether any significant pneumo- or hemothorax is present prior to pulling the tube, and 6 hours after pulling it

This CPG has been in effect for over 15 years with excellent results and dramatically shortened lengths of stay.  However, as with any good practice guideline, it needs occasional updates to stay abreast of new research literature or clinical experiences. We recognized that occasional patients had excessive drainage for an extended period of time. This led us to limit the length of time the tube was in to seven days. And we also noted that a few patients had visible hemothorax on their pre-pull imaging. These patients were very likely to return with clinical symptoms of lung entrapment, so we added a decision point to consider VATS at the end of the protocol.

I’ll share the full protocol tomorrow and provide a downloadable copy that you can modify for your own center. I’ll also give a little more commentary on the rationale for the key decision points in this CPG.

Related posts:

Complications, Pharmacy

Salmon Calcitonin After Spine Fractures?

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In my last post, I reviewed some data on the effectiveness of starting Vitamin D supplements after a patient sustains a fracture. The idea was that they might start building better bone and heal their fractures more readily if they boost their D levels. Unfortunately, this was not shown to be true.

Vitamin D improves bone health by facilitating absorption of calcium from the gut. This is a bit indirect and relies on sufficient intake of calcium and good hormonal regulation that directs osteoblasts to incorporate the mineral into bone. Why not work with those hormones directly to try to increase the amount of calcium that is deposited?

Calcitonin is a peptide hormone that has two major effects on calcium levels: it inhibits osteoclast activity that is breaking down bone and releasing calcium from it, and it inhibits calcium reabsorption in the kidneys which causes more to be excreted in the urine.

Perhaps giving calcitonin after sustaining a fracture might improve healing. Many orthopedic surgeons and neurosurgeons swear by this drug. Unfortunately, there are very few randomized, controlled studies of its use for this indication. A meta-analysis was performed that examined both utility and cost-effectiveness that I found interesting.

Here are the factoids:

  • There was some mild evidence that nasal calcitonin was effective in preventing vertebral fractures
    • One paper showed a benefit when giving 200 IU of intranasal salmon calcitonin daily over a 5 year period
    • But a benefit was not shown if 100 or 400 IU were given (this is weird)
    • A marker of bone turnover showed equal reduction in 200 and 400 IU groups (why isn’t this less in the 200 IU group?)
  • Financial analysis showed that it was only marginally cost effective
  • Current retail pricing is about $125 for a month supply
  • Mild side effects like runny nose and nausea are common
  • Intranasal calcitonin has been shown to reduce pain during healing of vertebral fractures

Bottom line: What does all of this mean? First, salmon calcitonin might decrease the number of future vertebral fractures. I say might because only the 200 IU dose in the study showed this effect. I can see where higher doses might be more effective to a point, but having only the middle dose show up as effective is just odd and makes me worry about the study.

The data does seem compelling that taking this product decreases pain during fracture healing. A meta-analysis of this showed that the effect probably only lasts up to a month. 

And finally, from a cost-effectiveness standpoint for avoiding future fractures, this medication is marginal. Luckily, it is relatively cheap at $125 retail and about $25 with insurance in the US. 

Wrapping it all up, intranasal salmon calcitonin might reduce fracture pain for a month and might decrease the likelihood of future vertebral fractures. However, the data are weak enough that cost-effectiveness is borderline. And there are more effective (and cheaper) analgesics available.

The absolute best way to strengthen bones is to exercise, especially engaging in weight-bearing activities. Not only does this strengthen bones, it also increases overall fitness and health. In general, medications are not the way to go to strengthen bones. It took decades for your patient to become osteoporotic. And while these drugs might improve their bone density slowly, a graduated and supervised exercise regimen is probably the best thing you can do for them.

References:

  • Efficacy of calcitonin for treating acute pain associated with osteoporotic vertebral compression fracture: an updated systematic review. CJEM 2020 May;22(3):359-367.
  • A Randomized Trial of Nasal Spray Salmon Calcitonin in Postmenopausal Women with Established Osteoporosis: the Prevent Recurrence of Osteoporotic Fractures Study. PharmacoEconomics, 2001, Vol.19 (5), p.565-575.
  • A randomized, double-blind, multicenter, placebo-controlled study to evaluate the efficacy and safety of oral salmon calcitonin in the treatment of osteoporosis in postmenopausal women taking calcium and vitamin D. Bone 2016 Oct;91:122-9.
Complications, Extremity

Giving Vitamin D After Fracture: Helpful Or Not?

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The role of Vitamin D in fracture healing is well known. So, of course, trauma professionals have tried to promote Vitamin D supplementation to counteract the effects of osteoporosis. A meta-analysis of of 12 papers on the topic relating to hip and other non-vertebral fractures showed that there was roughly a 25% risk reduction for any non-vertebral fractures in patients taking 700-800 U of Vitamin D supplements daily.

Sounds good, right? So what about taking Vitamin D after a fracture occurs? Seems like it should promote healing, right? A large meta-analysis in an orthopedics journal looked at this very question.

Unfortunately, there was a tremendous variability in the interventions, outcomes, and measures of variance. All the authors could do was summarize individual papers, and a true meta-analysis could not be performed.

Here are the factoids:

  •  81 papers made the cut for final review
  • A whopping 70% of the population with fractures had low Vitamin D levels
  • Vitamin D supplementation in hospital and after discharge did increase serum levels
  • Only one study, a meeting abstract which has still not seen the light of day in a journal, suggested a trend toward less malunions following a single loading dose of Vitamin D

Bottom line: Vitamin D is a great idea for people who are known to have, or are at risk for, osteoporosis and fractures. It definitely toughens up the bones and lowers the risk of fracture. However, the utility of giving it after a fall has not been shown. Of the 81 papers reviewed, none showed a significant impact on fracture healing. The only good thing is that Vitamin D supplements are cheap. Giving them may make us think that we are helping our patient heal, but it’s not. 

What about the use of calcitonin for preventing future fractures? Find that in my next post!

References:  

  • What is the role of vitamin D supplementation in acute fracture patients? A systematic review and meta-analysis of the prevalence of hypovitaminosis D and supplementation efficacy. J Orthopaedic Trauma 2016 Feb;30(2):53-63.
  • Fracture prevention with vitamin D supplementation: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. JAMA 293(18):2257-2264, 2005.