No significant differences in the amount of injected anesthetics and muscle relaxant were found. The group 1 patients were administered 1.5 ± 1.4 (range: 0 to 4) blood units and the group 2 patients 1.6 ± 1.5 (range: 0 to 4) blood units during the study duration.
No patient died during the study period. Sympathomimetic drugs were administered in four group 1 patients after CPB (epinephrine: one, dopamine: three) and in two group 2 patients (epinephrine: one, dobutamine: two). The patient in group 1 to whom epinephrine was administered required intra-aortic balloon pumping. In group 1, nitroglycerine was administered intravenously to five patients and sodium nitroprusside was administered to two patients during the study period. Nitroglycerine was administered to two group 2 patients. No patient received sympathomimetic drugs before or during CPB.
In Group 1, four patients presented with a total of 16 shivering episodes during the 4-h postoperative period vs no patient in group 1 (p<0.05). Two group 1 patients presented with ECG and enzymatic evidence of perioperative MI vs one group 2 patient. This last patient died 13 h after the end of surgery because of intractable arrhythmia and low cardiac output. No severe arrhythmia occurred in the other patients.