Assessment of Long-Term Postoperative Pain in Open Thoracotomy Patients: Pain Reduction by the Edge Closure Technique Noriaki Sakakura, MD, Noriyasu Usami, MD, Tetsuo Taniguchi, MD, Koji Kawaguchi, MD, Takehiko Okagawa, MD, Megumi Yokoyama, RN, Kohei Yokoi, MD The Annals of Thoracic Surgery Volume 89, Issue 4, Pages 1064-1070 (April 2010) DOI: 10.1016/j.athoracsur.2010.01.015 Copyright © 2010 The Society of Thoracic Surgeons Terms and Conditions
Fig 1 (A) Conventional closure; (B, C) edge closure. The Annals of Thoracic Surgery 2010 89, 1064-1070DOI: (10.1016/j.athoracsur.2010.01.015) Copyright © 2010 The Society of Thoracic Surgeons Terms and Conditions
Fig 2 Pain visualized in open thoracotomy patients. (A) Effect of age; (B) effect of type of thoracotomy; (C) intercostal muscle flap versus no flap; (D) effect of closure method; (E, F) effect of combination of thoracotomy and closure method. Each symbol and bar indicates the mean value and standard deviation of the pain score for each evaluation period. The Annals of Thoracic Surgery 2010 89, 1064-1070DOI: (10.1016/j.athoracsur.2010.01.015) Copyright © 2010 The Society of Thoracic Surgeons Terms and Conditions