Vol.97 No.10 contentsPRACTICA OTO-RHINO-LARYNGOLOGICA
Vol. 97 No.10 October 2004
The Usefulness of a Clinical Pathway for Patient
Care Management Following Tonsillectomy
Hiroshi Kajikawa and Takeshi Kubo
(Osaka University Graduate School of Medicine)
Kazuhiro Nario and Hiroshi Miyahara
(Osaka Prefectural General Hospital)
Recently, the use of clinical pathways has been introduced as a tool for improving medical quality in Japan. We applied a clinical pathway to the care management following tonsillectomy in adults and evaluated the outcome. In our pathway, sore throat, hemorrhage, diarrhea and fever elevation were the variables examined following tonsillectomy. For reduction of the level of these variables, in addition to our previous treatments, morphine was given at a dose of 20 mg per day for 2 days following the operation, and pre-operative antibiotic therapy was introduced. As a result of these changes, we observed the decreased appearance of sore throat, diarrhea and fever elevation after tonsillectomy.
Key words : clinical pathway, tonsillectomy, morphine, pre-operative antibiotic therapy