Treating Post-Operative Thirst With Flavoured Ice Lollies or Water - a Comparative Study to Improve Post-operative Discomfort (THIRST)

Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

Status: Completed

Conditions: Postoperative Thirst

Treatments: Other: Water; Other: Flavoured ice lollies (popsicles)

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT06014216

21/093/GHT

Details and patient eligibility

About

Patients are asked not to eat and drink before their operation, and we know that this can make people feel thirstier when they wake up from their anaesthetic. We want to know if giving patients ice lollies improves their thirst more than if they were given water. Gloucestershire Royal Hospital is funding and running a research study to find ways to try and improve this.

Full description

The 2019 peri-operative quality improvement project (PQIP) run by the Royal College of Anaesthetists showed 79% of patients experience moderate to severe thirst post-operatively. As a significant source of post-operative discomfort, resolving patient thirst may significantly improve their experience.

Whilst provision of oral fluids may be able to alleviate some thirst, many patients are unable to drink sufficient quantities to quench their thirst following an anaesthetic. Furthermore, studies have shown that frozen water is able to quench thirst to a greater degree than liquids.

The purpose of this study is to determine whether ice lollies quench post-operative thirst to a greater degree than water. Patients are already routinely offered water post-operatively, the offering of flavoured ice lollies is a novel intervention for our hospital. We intend to investigate two primary outcomes. First, can ice lollies quench post-operative thirst to a greater degree than water and therefore improve patient discomfort. Second, if ice lollies are found to be superior to water in quenching thirst and improving post-operative discomfort, do these patients take less time to recover from their operation?

Enrollment: 173 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

1. Patients over 18 years of age
2. Patients attending for elective surgery

Exclusion criteria

1. Allergy to products within the ice lolly
2. Designated nil-by-mouth by anaesthetic or surgical teams
3. Patient less than 18 years old
4. Patient unable to give consent
5. Refusal of patient to be involved with study

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Non-Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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173 participants in 2 patient groups

Patients allocated ice lollies to treat post-operative thirst

Experimental group

Description:

Ice lollies consisted of a flavoured ice popsicle (blackcurrant) provided through hospital catering. Participants were allocated a single ice popsicle with thirst scores recored pre and post intervention.

Treatment:

Other: Flavoured ice lollies (popsicles)

Patients allocated water as control comparison

Other group

Description:

Water is a routine treatment for post-operative thirst and therefore used a control to compare our intervention against.

Treatment:

Other: Water