Onia Orinate Peters, Egeh Perpetua Chinasa and Nicholas Clement Nwachinemere
Background: Thoracentesis and paracentesis are key procedures for managing pleural effusions. While their clinical efficacy is recognized, their impact on patient-reported outcomes (PROs) encompassing physical, psychological, and social wellbeing remains poorly understood, especially in resource-constrained settings like Nigeria. This scoping review mapped and synthesized the existing literature on PROs following these procedures in Nigerian patients.
Methods: Following the Joanna Briggs Institute (JBI) methodology for scoping reviews, a systematic search was conducted across PubMed, PMC, Scopus, EMBASE, AJOL, and CINAHL for studies published between 2015 and 2025. Data from eligible studies were extracted and charted to summarize study characteristics, methodologies, and PRO findings.
Results: The review identified a critical scarcity of primary research investigating PROs post-thoracentesis and paracentesis in Nigeria. Existing literature focuses predominantly on clinical management, etiology (notably tuberculosis and malignancy), and complication rates. PRO data, when mentioned, is largely descriptive, with no Nigerian studies employing validated Patient-Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs). This highlights a significant disconnect between procedural success and patient-centered care assessment in this context.
Conclusion: This review underscores a severe evidence gap regarding the patient experience of pleural effusion procedures in Nigeria. There is an urgent need for robust, prospective studies that integrate validated PROMs, such as the Visual Analogue Scale for Dyspnoea (VASD), to evaluate the true impact of these interventions on quality of life. The findings call for the development of patient-centered care pathways tailored to the unique challenges of the Nigerian healthcare system.