Long-term pulmonary functional status following coronary artery bypass grafting surgery

Background: the present study aimed to describe the long-term alterations of pulmonaryfunction and also to describe its association with post-operative pain after coronary arterybypass grafting (cabg) surgery.methods: in this prospective study, thirty non-smoker male patients undergoing isolated onpumpcabg were consecutively included in this study. pulmonary function measurements wereperformed, in a sitting position, preoperatively, a week postoperatively, and 6 months after thesurgery using a medical graphics pf/dx pulmonary function system. pain was determined byusing visual analog scale (vas) pain scores with a standardized questionnaire’s.results: regarding functional class, all patients had new york heart association (nyha)class ii to iii. a week after operation, a severe restrictive pulmonary impairment was revealedwith a mean decrease in vc to 60.9 ± 9.2% and in forced expiratory volume in one second(fev1) to 64.6 ± 12.2% of pre-operative values (p < 0.001). regarding sternotomy related pain,the mean pain vas score was preoperatively 3.3 ± 1.5 that reached to 6.2 ± 2.5 and 4.8 ± 2.2 1week and 6 months after the operation (p < 0.001). the trend of the changes in pain scorewithin 6 months of operation was significantly similar to the trend of the changes in somepulmonary function indices such as fev% and residual volume (rv).conclusion: a significant reduction is expected in most pulmonary functional parametersfollowing cabg despite normal pulmonary function state preoperatively. severe pain originatedfrom sternotomy may be an important factor related to pulmonary dysfunction following cabg.