Association of patient characteristics with postoperative opioid consumption following cesarean delivery: a single center retrospective study

The primary aim of our study was to determine which patient characteristics were associated with opioid consumption following cesarean delivery. The Baylor Scott & White Research Institute institutional review board approved this study (024-178). Patients who underwent cesarean delivery at Baylor Scott & White Medical Center - Temple with single injection or combined spinal epidural anesthesia in 2023 were eligible for inclusion. We examined the medical records of 300 patients, calculated the 24-hour opioid consumption for each, and compared the top third to the low group in a bivariate analysis and then performed a multivariate logistic regression. One hundred thirty-one patients had no opioid consumption in the first 24 postoperative hours, and 100 patients had a morphine milligram consumption of 30 to 117.5 mg. A multivariate logistic regression determined that patients in the higher opioid consumption cohort were more likely to have received combined spinal epidural anesthesia (odds ratio 2.079; 95% confidence interval 1.149, 3.762; = 0.02) and administration of intravenous dexmedetomidine in the intraoperative period (odds ratio 2.542; 95% confidence interval 1.038, 6.224; = 0.04). Intraoperative administration of intravenous dexmedetomidine and combined spinal epidural anesthesia was associated with increased postoperative opioid consumption following cesarean delivery.