A Comparative Study on Effect of Benzydamine Mouth Gargle and Povidone Iodine Mouth Gargle on Post Tonsillectomy Pain.

Although Tonsillectomy is one of the most common surgeries in ENT, a highly reliable and effective method of reducing post tonsillectomy pain is yet to be identified. An adequate post operative analgesia is essential after tonsillectomy as pain following tonsillectomy impairs swallowing with a risk of dehydration, infection and secondary haemorrhage. Usage of mouth gargle in postoperative period is found to have significant role in controlling pain. The aim of this study is to analyse and compare effectiveness of Benzydamine and Povidone Iodine gargle on post tonsillectomy pain. The study group consists of total 60 patients who underwent tonsillectomy only by dissection and snare method in two hospitals attached to the same institute during the mentioned time period by more than one operating surgeon. All patients received the same analgesics and antibiotics during the post operative period, no steroids were given. Those patients for which diathermy or other methods of haemostasis was used were not included in the study population. Post tonsillectomy pain for 9 days was compared between two study groups of those using Benzydamine gargle [group 1] and Povidone Iodine gargle [group 2]with the help of visual analogue scale (VAS) with each group comprising of 30 patients. Our study showed homogenous distribution of age and sex among the patients as well as comparable grades of tonsil in both the study groups. The mean VAS score was 6.20 and 6.87 on post operative day 1 wheras 2.63 and 5.47on post operative day 9 in group 1 and 2 respectively. According to this study better control over post tonsillectomy pain was seen in the study group who were on Benzydamine mouth gargle when compared to Povidone Iodine. The study results were compared to various similar studies and it turned out that Benzydamine was found to be more effective than other local analgesics and Povidone Iodine. One of the studies showed improvement in post operative pain using Povidone Iodine also, but in general it was found that use of analgesic mouth gargle in post tonsillectomy helped better to tackle the pain and thereby increase the quality of life in the post operative period. Our study showed that those patients who used Benzydamine gargle had better control over post tonsillectomy pain compared to those patients on Povidone Iodine gargle.