Noninvasive Device Reduces pain and Opioid Use After Cesarean Delivery

In a landmark clinical trial unveiled promising results that could potentially revolutionize pain management for women after cesarean deliveries. The findings were published in Journal of American Medical Association.

This study conducted from April 2022 to January 2023, sought to determine if a noninvasive, high-frequency electrical stimulation device could effectively reduce opioid use and pain in the postoperative period.

The study, involving 134 postpartum individuals who underwent cesarean delivery, was conducted using a rigorous, triple-blind design, meaning neither the patients nor the healthcare providers knew which group they were in. The participants were randomly assigned to one of two groups: a high-frequency (20,000 Hz) electrical stimulation device group or a sham device group.

The findings of the study were:

Those in the functional device group used significantly less opioid medication before discharge than those in the sham device group. Specifically, the functional device group used a median of 19.75 morphine milligram equivalents (MME), while the sham device group used a median of 37.50 MME.

Moreover, participants in the functional device group reported similar rates of moderate to severe pain and mean pain scores compared to the sham device group, meaning that pain control was not compromised. In fact, those using the functional device were more likely to be discharged without an opioid prescription, further indicating the potential of device to reduce opioid use.

Notably, no treatment-related adverse events occurred in either group, underlining the safety and effectiveness of this noninvasive approach.

These findings suggest that the use of a high-frequency electrical stimulation device as part of a multimodal analgesia protocol may significantly reduce opioid use in the immediate postoperative period and decrease the number of opioids prescribed at discharge for women who undergo cesarean delivery.

Source: 

Grasch, J. L., Costantine, M. M., Mast, D. D. D., Klopfenstein, B., Russo, J. R., Summerfield, T. L., & Rood, K. M. (2023). Noninvasive Bioelectronic Treatment of Postcesarean Pain. In JAMA Network Open (Vol. 6, Issue 10, p. e2338188). American Medical Association (AMA). https://doi.org/10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2023.38188