DIGITAL BLOCKS WITH ADRENALINE - AN OLD DOGMA REFUTED

In the early part of the century, when adrenaline first became widely available, it was used in an uncontrolled manner and cases of ischaemi c necrosis led to it falling into disfavour for hand surgery. Local an aesthesia with adrenaline is currently widely used for palmar and dors al hand surgery but there remains a very deeply ingrained resistance t o its use for digital anaesthesia. It is widely thought that it will c ause irreversible digital artery vasospasm, This prospective study rep orts the effect of 2% lignocaine with 1:80 000 adrenaline digital bloc ks on various parameters of digital arterial blood flow in 100 consecu tive patients. Our findings show that adrenaline only temporarily redu ced digital blood flow. Perfusion of the digits persisted in every cas e.