The Frequency of Dysphagia after Intraoperative Transesophageal Echocardiography in Open Cardiac Surgery

Objectives: The current study tries to assess the causative factors of dysphagia and omit them to find the exact contribution of TEE for this symptom among patients who suffer from elective open cardiac surgery in different age ranges in both sexes. Methods: In this observational study, 100 patients between 30-80 years of age with ASA < III and EF > 40% who were candidate for elective open cardiac surgery in a referral hospital in Tehran in 2011 were recruited. The patients were divided into two groups based on TEE performance; patients who needed to perform TEE based on medical indication were considered the case group and the other patients who did not have indication for TEE, formed the control group. Results: Total frequency of dysphagia was 13% in all patients disregarding TEE performance while 6 (12%) and 7 (14%) of controls and cases showed this symptom respectively. Odynophagia was the other symptom to be assessed for its frequency in this study and showed 13% total frequency considering all participants disregarding the groups. This symptom was reported exactly similar to dysphagia which was 6 (12%) in controls and 7 (14%) in cases. The participants’ gender was not effective on the distribution of dysphagia where 6 (11.3%) females and 7 (14.9%) males were involved with no significant difference. Conclusions: Intraoperative trans-esophageal echocardiography during cardiac surgeries has greater usefulness than complications and is worth using in this case as well.