Intravenous fluids for body fluid management during abdominal aortic surgery

There is not enough evidence to show the best fluid replacement to use during and following surgery on the abdominal aorta. Surgery on the abdominal aorta is a major surgical procedure with a mortality of 1.5% in elective patients and up to 5% in emergency surgery. Fluid replacement is needed to replace tissue fluids lost during surgery. Blood products, non-blood products, or combinations including crystalloid solutions and colloids are used. Combination therapy is most common. The review of trials found that although 38 randomised trials involving 1589 patients were identified, there was not enough evidence on the benefits of any particular individual or combination fluid therapy. No single fluid affected any outcome measure significantly more than another fluid across a range of outcomes. The trials used many different fluid replacement comparisons so that few results could be pooled. Important outcomes are the need for allogenic blood transfusion, complications of organ failure, and length of stay in both the intensive care unit and hospital.