Evidence map›Paper›PMID 40022238›Full record

ArticlePerioperative medicine (London, England)2025

Sublingual sufentanil after orthopaedic and abdominal surgery: long-term outcome and safety.

Michael Borck, Jan D Wandrey, Claudia Spies, Sascha Tafelski

Registry-linked trialAbstract read
PubMed Full text at PMC Publisher
In one paragraph

Article in Perioperative medicine (London, England), 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT03133858 (Longitudinal Cohort Study - for the Treatment of Acute Postoperative Pain and Postoperative Delirium, Postoperative Cognitive Dysfunctions, and Chronic Pain.), which is not on this map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

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0cells of the map it votes in
0citing papers in PubMed
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1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

NCT03133858 completednot on this map

Longitudinal Cohort Study - for the Treatment of Acute Postoperative Pain and Postoperative Delirium, Postoperative Cognitive Dysfunctions, and Chronic Pain.

TypeobservationalSponsorCharite University, Berlin, GermanyRan2017 to 2021Enrolled80ConditionsPain, Delirium, Postoperative Cognitive Dysfunction
3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

0 citing papers in PubMed.

No citing paper in PubMed yet.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

4 authors.

Michael Borck *Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin, corporate member of Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, and Berlin Institute of Health, Charitéplatz 1, Berlin, 10117, Germany. michael.borck@charite.de.
Jan D Wandrey *Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin, corporate member of Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, and Berlin Institute of Health, Charitéplatz 1, Berlin, 10117, Germany.
Claudia SpiesCharité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin, corporate member of Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, and Berlin Institute of Health, Charitéplatz 1, Berlin, 10117, Germany.
Sascha TafelskiCharité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin, corporate member of Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, and Berlin Institute of Health, Charitéplatz 1, Berlin, 10117, Germany.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

backgroundAcute postoperative pain management often requires opioid treatment with patient-controlled analgesia (PCA). Non-invasive PCA with a sublingual sufentanil tablet system (SSTS) may reduce acute pain sufficiently, but opioids are associated with central nerve system side effects and risk of long-term opioid use postoperatively. The objective of this study was to observe the SSTS to assess the incidence of postoperative chronic pain (PCP) and postoperative delirium (POD).

methodsThis was a longitudinal cohort study based at a university hospital between November 2017 and November 2021. Adults undergoing elective orthopaedic knee or abdominal surgery planned for PCA as postoperative pain management were included. They received the SSTS in addition to a standardised pain medication protocol depending on the surgery they underwent. Exclusion criteria were pregnancy, emergency surgery, concurrent participation in another clinical trial and chronic opioid use before surgery. Patients were followed after surgery in hospital and over 3 and 12 months for pain, cognitive function and side effects.

resultsAltogether N = 80 patients were included with SSTS postoperatively. Daily pain experience decreased from pre-operatively 89.2% of patients to 45.7% and 22.5% at 3 and 12 months. None of our patients developed postoperative delirium after surgery. Patients reported high overall satisfaction with SSTS (median 8.0/10 points, IQR 3). However, 51% of patients had difficulties with handling the SSTS and required acute replacement of the authentication tag.

conclusionsSSTS sufficiently treated acute postoperative pain without incidence of POD and demonstrated good tolerability and overall ease. Postoperative pain improved significantly over time but 22% still reported chronic pain related to surgery. Technical issues with the identification thumb tag limited the feasibility of SSTS.

trial registrationThis prospective longitudinal cohort study was approved by the ethics committee of the Charité Universitätsmedizin Berlin (Ethics committee 2, Campus Charité Virchow Klinikum, EA2/041/17, Prof. Dr. jur. R. Seeland, 21.03.2017) and was registered in the study register ( https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03133858 ).

Indexed as

Patient-controlled analgesiaPostoperative chronic painPostoperative deliriumPostoperative pain managementSublingual sufentanil tablet system

Identifiers

PMID40022238
PMCPMC11869576

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Registered trials

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