Differentiating between anaphylaxis and hypotension during general anaesthesia is difficult, especially when patients present with only hypotension and without any of the other classical features of anaphylaxis. We report the successful management of an anaphylactic reaction to rocuronium that presented as isolated hypotension in a 45-year-old Indonesian man presented with lacerations on the scalp and right pinna caused by an assault to the head after the induction of general anaesthesia, refractory to fluids and high doses of vasopressors. This case highlights that a possible indicator of anaphylaxis can be the presence of isolated hypotension during.
Quadratus lumborum block (QLB) has been described as a regional analgesic technique in various abdominal surgeries. We present a case report of a high-risk patient who underwent ovarian cystectomy with QLB and deep sedation after failed neuraxial anesthesia. A 29-year-old female patient with comorbidities osteogenesis imperfecta, severe kyphoscoliosis with restrictive lung disease, and cervical syringomyelia with cranio-cervical junction stenosis (C2/C3). The patient had large ovarian cysts with associated dyspnea. She accepted surgery-an open bilateral ovarian cystectomy-despite being advised that general anesthesia would be high-risk. Regional anesthetic options were limited and challenging, given her anatomy and difficulty in positioning. Neuraxial anesthesia was attempted but was unsuccessful. The patient safely underwent surgery (lower midline laparotomy) using QLB. This clinically challenging case demonstrates the feasibility of QLB as the mainstay multimodal anesthetic approach (without general and neuraxial anesthesia) for abdominal surgery under exceptional circumstances.