According to a recent study, Ketamine has a favorable safety and efficacy profile for the management of abdominal pain patients in emergency medicine. The goal of David Häske et al. was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of utilizing Ketamine as an analgesic for abdominal pain.

All cases where paramedics delivered Ketamine as analgesia for abdominal pain were examined in terms of patient safety and pain relief and contrasted with other analgesic medications such as Metamizole, Morphine, and Fentanyl in a retrospective analysis of prehospital patient data within the scope of quality assurance. Overall, 129 datasets were examined.

Notably, 50 ± 19 years (19-90 years) was the mean age of the patient, and there were 47.3% of women (n = 61). Ketamine was used as a monotherapy in 52.7% (n = 68) of cases, Metamizole in 34.1% (n = 44) of cases, Morphine in 2.3% (n = 3) of cases, and Fentanyl in 10.9% (n = 14) of cases.

Metamizole, Fentanyl, and Ketamine all provided differed pain alleviation, although Ketamine and Fentanyl provided similar pain relief. According to the quality assurance criterion of effective analgesia (pain reduction ≥ 2 points or pain on handover Numerical Rating Scale [NRS] < 5), Ketamine, Metamizole, and Fentanyl, all demonstrated successful analgesia in 92.6% (n = 68), 65.9% (n = 44), and 92.9% (n = 13) of cases, respectively.

Patients using Ketamine did not experience any adverse events. Ketamine can be used to provide analgesia that is similar to Fentanyl. Hence, Ketamine appears to be promising for abdominal pain management.