Comparison of the postoperative analgesic efficacy of intravenous patient-controlled analgesia with tramadol to intravenous patient-controlled analgesia with opioids

IVPCA tramadol appears to produce similar pain scores when compared with that from IVPCA opioids; however, the side effect profile is different between the two groups. Because of the relatively small sample size, no determination of the relative "safety" (eg, respiratory depression) of one regimen over the other can be made, and larger RCTs would be needed for such a determination.