Anesthesia: More Dangerous Than You Think?

Is anesthesia dangerous? It’s already a question that anyone about to have surgery worries about.

Anesthesia comes in three main types. Local anesthesia, the mildest form, merely numbs a very small area, such as a single tooth. Regional anesthesia desensitizes a large section of someone’s body by injecting drugs into the spine that block nerve signals to the brain. Often a patient getting regional anesthesia also takes a relatively small dose of a powerful sedative drug, such as propofol—not enough to put them under but enough to alter brain activity in a way that makes the person less aware and responsive.

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It is very common for it to take a 1-2 days to feel normal and coherent after anesthesia has been administered. But now, experts aren’t sure if this is caused by the surgery, or the anesthesia. A new study performed on mice showed that general anesthesia may negatively affect the brain cells that are responsible for memory and learning.

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How To Prevent Anesthesia Side Effects:

• See If Family Members Have Had Reactions to Anesthesia. Although very rare, some people are genetically susceptible to have dangerous reactions to anesthesia, such as a severe spike in blood pressure. So, it’s always worth asking your family to make sure. If someone in your family has had such a reaction, tell your doctor.
• Ask Your Doctor About Alternatives. Who knows, there can be alternatives that your doctor can use. And those alternatives may not have been brought up for a number of reasons: 1) More time consuming, not a popular, or simply because no one…
• 
  has asked.
• Eat Correctly. The night before surgery, many doctors may tell you that you shouldn’t eat anything after midnight. But why? If you go under anesthesia with food in your stomach, you may vomit up some of this food and breathe it in. This can lead not only to aspiration pneumonia but then potentially make it impossible to get oxygen into your lungs during the anesthesia procedure — and without oxygen, systems within your body fail and you can die. Be sure to ask your doctor about any herbal supplements you may be taking as well.

“Research shows that if you’re exposed to these agents during the time neurons are growing, it disrupts their development,” said Jeffrey Silverstein, MD, professor of anesthesiology, Surgery and Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City. “But this is the first paper indicating that this happens in adults.”