SPONTANEOUS MOVEMENTS ASSOCIATED WITH ROCURONIUM - IS PAIN ON INJECTION THE CAUSE

Spontaneous movements are sometimes observed of the arm into which roc uronium is administered. In order to assess a possible relationship be tween these movements and pain, we injected in 10 awake, ASA I patient s, in a double-blind manner, both rocuronium 1 ml (10 mg) and 0.9% NaC l 1 ml (placebo), with a 30-s interval in between. None of the patient s receiving placebo complained of pain, but eight of 10 patients repor ted a strong burning pain during injection of rocuronium with brisk fl exion of the elbow and wrist, similar to those observed in patients af ter induction of anaesthesia. A second injection of rocuronium did not produce such pain and no movements were observed. We conclude that in jection of rocuronium is associated with severe, burning pain of short duration, responsible for the spontaneous movements in the arm observ ed after induction of anaesthesia.