Coblation Tonsillectomy:Comparing The Outcomes Of The Use Of Different Normal Saline Temperatures For Plasma Coblation On Pain And Tissue Damage

INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVES:Coblation is one of the novel modality of high frequency cold plasma ablation with minimal tissue damage and postoperative pain. With the dependence on coblation in our hospital, we decided to compare the outcomes of the use of different normal saline temperatures on postoperative pain and tissue damage.METHODSDifferent normal saline temperatures were used in randomly selected19patients with sleep apnea which required surgical mode of treatment especially tonsillectomy.(53%) of the patients were male, and (47%) were female patients. With group1-which had10patients-4degrees centigrade normal saline temperature was used, while25degrees centigrade normal saline temperature was used for the rest of the patients; group2. Visual Analog Scale and FLACC scale were then used to measure the level of pain for each group for a period of three postoperative days. To measure tissue damage, tonsil specimens were put under Olympus microscope, and the damage was measured by Photoshop computer software.RESULTSThe4degrees normal saline temperature group showed no statistically significant difference from the25degrees centigrade temperature group in terms of pain levels and tissue damage. The P value of the average of the two groups using VAS was0.32, while the P value of the average of the two groups using FLACC was0.25which means there is no statistically significant difference between pain levels of the two groups, although pain scores are slightly less in group1. The average tissue damage for group1was0.36mm, and the average tissue damage for group2was0.39mm with P value=0.41.CONCLUSION:We support the idea that coblation tonsillectomy is one of the best techniques due to its decreased tissue damage therefore postoperative pain. Though our results show no statistically significant difference, we encourage more researches to be done on this topic.