Successful pain control by continuous epidural infusion of ropivacaine for a pregnant woman with biliary colic

This report describes a pregnant woman with common bile duct stones whose colic was successfully treated by prolonged continuous epidural infusion of ropivacaine. A 32-year-old woman in the 26th week pregnancy complained of severe abdominal pain due to common bile duct stones. We adopted ropivacaine for infusion into the epidural space using patient controlled analgesia system considering fetoplacental circulation. We administered the solution successfully for 3 weeks, but we observed that the effectiveness of ropivacaine became reduced. This suggests that tachyphilaxis to ropivacaine might have developed by its long-term infusion.