None listed
Conditions
Brief summary
This study looks at the use of the nasogastric tube in the management of small bowel obstruction in patients with a history of abdominal surgery. The null hypothesis is that not using the nasogatric tube results in an more operations than the nasogastric tube. Small bowel obstruction is a surgical emergency and at its worst can result in the death of a patient due to small bowel infarction. The accepted standard of care is insertion of a nasogastric tube to decompress a distended stomach. There is little if any research evidence to support this practice and this study seeks to compare this practice to not using a nasogastric tube and observe if it results in less patients having srugery to the condition.
Interventions
No nasogastric tube, in addition to standard care which may include intravenous fluids, analgesia, anti-emetics, and/or surgery as determined by surgeon in charge based on progress of signs and symptoms of bowel onstruction including radiological changes.
Adherence to ransomisation will be recorded from the medical record.
Sponsors
Hunter New England Local Health District
Study design
Allocation
Randomised controlled trial
Intervention model
Parallel
Primary purpose
Treatment
Masking
Open (masking not used)
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
All
Age
18 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
No
Inclusion criteria
• Patients 18 years and over. • Past history of abdominal surgery. • Radiological evidence of small bowel obstruction. • Direct presentation to the hospital from home or usual place for residence.
Exclusion criteria
• Are unable to give written informed consent to take part in the study, or do not have a designated person responsible that can provide consent until the participant is well enough to consent for themselves. • Patients who require the use of a trained healthcare interpreter and present after hours when a trained health care interpreter may not be available in a timely manner. • Patients readmitted with SBO within follow-up time-points of study. • Patients transferred from other hospitals • Patient who has had a nasogastric tube inserted by other staff prior to surgical review, eg Emergency Department Senior Medical officer. • Known malignancies that may cause obstruction. • Radiological evidence of a mass lesion causing obstruction. • Obstruction caused by hernias. • Radiological evidence of need for urgent surgery based on ischaemic small intestine. • Pregnant females. • Recent history of aspiration pneumonia • Patients not considered to have a survivable condition.
Outcome results
None listed