Highly increased blood pressure following stellate ganglion block: A case report

Lee, Cheong; Park, Dong Ho; Kim, Young Ju; Chung, Ji hyun; Hwang, Jinhwan; Ryu, Jaekyu

Case Report

Spinal Pain

Anesthesia and Pain Medicine 2011;6(3):221-224.
Published online July 30, 2011.

Highly increased blood pressure following stellate ganglion block: A case report

Cheong Lee, Dong Ho Park, Young Ju Kim, Ji hyun Chung, Jinhwan Hwang, Jaekyu Ryu

Department of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine, Eulji University School of Medicine, Daejeon, Korea. donghop6212@dreamwiz.com

Abstract

Stellate ganglion block (SGB) is a procedure that is widely used for many diseases associated with sympathetically-maintained pain in the head, neck, and upper extremities. Various hemodynamic changes may occur after SGB. Among them, we experienced two patients who developed highly increased blood pressure after SGB. We suspect that the spread of local anesthetics produced parasympathetic blockade of the vagus nerve, an imbalance between the sympathetic and parasympathetic activities and deafferentiation of the glossopharyngeal and vagus nerve, which both innervated the carotid sinus, as the mechanism of this increased blood pressure.

Key Words: Carotid sinus, Increased blood pressure, Stellate ganglion block