Caudal Anaesthesia: clonidine and morphine dosing and outcomes in paediatric cardiac surgery

Amy L Kiskaddon; Semerjit Bains; Andrew H Smith; James A Quintessenza; Shannon Frank; Gerson Rodriguez-Fazzi; Vyas M Kartha

doi:10.1017/S1047951125100620

Caudal Anaesthesia: clonidine and morphine dosing and outcomes in paediatric cardiac surgery

Cardiol Young. 2025 Jul 3:1-4. doi: 10.1017/S1047951125100620. Online ahead of print.

Authors

Amy L Kiskaddon^{1

2

3

4}, Semerjit Bains^{5

6}, Andrew H Smith⁷, James A Quintessenza⁴, Shannon Frank⁴, Gerson Rodriguez-Fazzi⁵, Vyas M Kartha^{5

6}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Pediatrics, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA.
² Institute for Clinical and Translational Research, Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital, St. Petersburg, FL, USA.
³ Department of Pharmacy, Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital, St. Petersburg, FL, USA.
⁴ Heart Institute, Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital, St. Petersburg, FL, USA.
⁵ Department of Anesthesiology, Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital, St. Petersburg, FL, USA.
⁶ Division of Anesthesia and Critical Care, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA.
⁷ Division of Pediatric Critical Care, Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt, Nashville, TN, USA.

PMID: 40605632
DOI: 10.1017/S1047951125100620

Abstract

We describe caudal analgesia agent, dose, reported adverse events, and outcomes in a single-centre, retrospective cohort study of 200 patients undergoing cardiac surgery from October 2020 to April 2023. Median (interquartile range) doses of clonidine and morphine were 2.7 (2.1-3) mCg/kg and 0.12 (0.1-1.12) mg/kg, respectively. Our findings suggest that a clonidine/morphine caudal was tolerated in cardiac surgical patients.

Keywords: anaesthesia; cardiac surgery; paediatric.