The effect of lung recruitment maneuvers on post-operative pulmonary complications for patients undergoing general anesthesia: A meta-analysis

Background
Respiratory function would be impaired during general anesthesia period. Researchers devoted their energies to finding effective strategies for protecting respiratory function. Low tidal volume, positive end-expiratory pressure (PEEP), and lung recruitment maneuvers (LRMs) were recommended for patients under mechanical ventilation. However, based on the current evidence, there was no consensus on whether LRMs should be routinely used for anesthetized patients with healthy lungs, and the benefits of them remained to be determined.
Materials and methods
To evaluate the benefits of LRMs on patients undergoing surgery with general anesthesia, we searched relevant studies in PubMed, EMBASE, Ovid Medline and the Cochrane Library up to June 30, 2018. The primary outcome was postoperative pulmonary complications (PPCs).
Results
Twelve trials involving 2756 anesthetized patients were included. The results of our study showed a significant benefit of LRMs for reducing the incidence of PPCs (RR = 0.67; 95%CI, 0.49 to 0.90; P<0.05; Chi2 = 32.94, p for heterogeneity = 0.0005, I2 = 67%). After subgroup analyses, we found LRMs combining with lung protective ventilation strategy and sustained recruitment maneuvers were associated with reducing the occurrence of PPCs. The results also revealed that the use of LRMs improved PaO2/FiO2 in non-obese patients, but with extremely high heterogeneity (I2 = 95%).
Conclusion
According to the findings from contemporary meta-analysis, LRMs combining with lung protective ventilation strategy may have an association with decreasing in the incidence of PPCs and improvement of oxygenation on non-obese patients. However, the conclusions must be interpreted cautiously as the outcome may be influenced dramatically due to varied LRMs and ventilation patterns.