Incidence & Management of Emergence Delirium in Pediatrics Patients

Abstract

Background: Child surgical complications include Emergent Delirium (ED), which causes anxiety and bewilderment after anesthesia. Understanding the incidence of this condition and finding effective treatments affects patient outcomes and recovery.

Methods: 120 pediatric patients were studied retrospectively at IGIMS Patna from January to June 2023. Medical records and anesthetic documents were used to assess ED frequency, management, and patient demographics. The study assessed therapy efficacy and risk variables using SPSS 28.0's descriptive statistics, Chi-square tests, T-tests/ANOVA, and logistic regression.

Results: The 4–6-year-old age group had the greatest ED rates (34.3%), with a total incidence of 20.8%. Emergency procedures showed a non-significant higher risk than elective procedures (p=0.058), but gender did not affect ED incidence (p=0.852). ED patients responded best to dexmedetomidine, which relieved symptoms in 87.5% of cases. Propofol caused 20.0% of issues but resolved 80.0% and 83.3% with parental present. No difficulties were noted, but distraction methods had the lowest resolution rate at 66.7%. Logistic regression showed that dexmedetomidine outperformed the other medications (p=0.001).

Conclusion: Pediatric patients, especially those aged 4–6, may have acute delirium after surgery. The best erectile dysfunction treatments were dexmedetomidine and parental presence. These findings emphasize the importance of behavioral and pharmacological approaches on patient outcomes. Future research should refine these methods and investigate novel ED management methods.