The dose-response relationship of mivacurium chloride in humans during nitrous oxide-fentanyl or nitrous oxide-enflurane anesthesia

The dose-response relationships of mivacurium chloride during N2O/fentanyl or N2O/enflurane anesthesia were compared in 70 patients intraoperatively. Responses were defined in terms of percentage changes in the evoked twitch tension of the adductor pollicis muscle, and dose-response curves were constructed following probit transformation of the responses. End-tidal concentrations of enflurane during the were study were 0.9-1.2%. When compared with the dose-response curve determined during N2O/fentanyl anesthesia the curve determined during N2O/enflurane anesthesia was displaced significantly to the left (P less than 0.05). As a result, the doses of mivacurium that depressed twitch tension by 50% (ED50) and 95% (ED95) were 39 and 67 micrograms/kg, respectively, during N2O/fentanyl anesthesia, and 27 and 52 micrograms/kg during N2O/enflurane anesthesia. Regression lines describing the relationship between the maximum depression of twitch tension (response) and the time interval between the injection of mivacurium and the return of twitch tension to 90% of the control value (duration) were constructed. The response-duration line for N2O/enflurane anesthesia was displaced significantly to the left of the line for N2O/fentanyl (P less than 0.05), indicating that enflurane anesthesia was associated with a prolongation of mivacurium-induced neuromuscular blockade. The neuromuscular blocking effect of mivacurium is both enhanced by and prolonged during N2O/enflurane compared with that during N2O/fentanyl anesthesia.