Doctors are always asked these questions about anesthesia before surgery, so let’s talk about the differences in commonly used anesthesia methods and the differences in experience.
Anesthesia methods that are commonly used include general anesthesia, “hemianesthesia,” and local anesthesia.
General anesthesia: “Sleeping through” the surgery.
General anesthesia, i.e. general anesthesia, refers to the anesthetic drugs through the respiratory tract inhalation, intravenous and other methods into the patient’s body, thus producing the central nervous system inhibition, so that the patient enters the consciousness disappears and no pain sensation of a functional inhibition state. This inhibition can be controlled and regulated, and is completely reversible.
General anesthesia is simply let a person fall asleep?
General anesthesia process, anesthesiologists mainly apply sedative drugs, analgesics, muscle relaxants and other drugs to maintain the patient’s general anesthesia to meet the needs of surgery.
Sedatives are drugs that make the patient “asleep” and unconscious. Analgesics are drugs that reduce the pain response during surgery. Myorelaxants are medications that relax the patient’s muscles to meet the needs of the operation.
Patients in general anesthesia “asleep” depth than people usually sleep “asleep” deeper, surgical operations, pain stimulation, etc. will not know or wake up.
General anesthesia patients usually need to be assisted to breathe, because general anesthesia surgery is often used in the use of muscle relaxants, the patient’s independent breathing will also be inhibited, so the need for external machines to help breathing.
During general anesthesia surgery, anesthesiologists have to do a lot of things, need to pay attention to the stimulation of the surgical operation on the patient as well as the stimulation-induced changes in vital signs, and make timely and appropriate treatment, such as adjusting the blood pressure to avoid violent fluctuations, stabilizing the heart rate to avoid myocardial ischemia and cardiac arrhythmia, keeping the airway open, and replenishing fluids and electrolytes in a timely manner.
Besides, anesthesiologists have to deal with emergencies in time, such as hemorrhage, cardiac arrest, ventricular fibrillation, anaphylactic shock and other critical situations.
When would general anesthesia be an option?
Theoretically, general anesthesia can be used for all types of surgeries, and at the same time, general anesthesia is often the preferred anesthesia method for surgeons. It can meet the needs of different surgical operations, but also ensure patient compliance, reduce the psychological and physiological stress caused by surgery, and improve patient comfort.
Then why not all clinical surgery must choose general anesthesia? Although general anesthesia is applicable to a wide range of surgical procedures, there are many advantages, but for relatively small or superficial local anesthesia or intrathecal anesthesia can be completed surgery, it is a little bit “too big to use”.
“Half anesthesia”: you can know your surgery process
People often say “half anesthesia”, in fact, is called intraspinal anesthesia, commonly used in clinical practice, including subarachnoid anesthesia and epidural anesthesia, all belong to the category of intraspinal anesthesia. So where is the spinal canal? The spinal canal is a tubular structure formed by the foramina of all vertebrae, in which the spinal cord and other tissues “live”.
During “hemianesthesia”, the anesthesiologist operates on the patient’s lower back with a puncture needle and injects anesthetic drugs into the cerebrospinal fluid or epidural space, thus blocking the sensory transmission of nerves and achieving the effect of “hemianesthesia”. That is, people often describe “the anesthesiologist injected a needle in my waist, and after a while I could not feel anything in my legs”.
Patients under “hemianesthesia” are conscious, i.e. “not asleep”, but they do not feel pain in the blocked area of the body. This is because the anesthesia drug blocks the transmission of pain sensation in the area where the patient is having surgery, while other bodily functions are not affected.
Intravertebral anesthesia is mainly applied to: lower abdomen, pelvis, anus, perineum and lower limb surgery, cesarean section, labor analgesia, etc.
However, not all of the above surgery are suitable for “half anesthesia”, which is why the same appendectomy, some people use “half anesthesia”, while some people have to use general anesthesia.
Who should not undergo “general anesthesia”?
If the patient has the following conditions are not suitable for the use of “half anesthesia”, including central nervous system disease (such as spinal cord lesions), systemic infectious diseases, severe hypertension, shock, anemia, spinal trauma or deformity, intra-abdominal pressure significantly increased (such as abdominal cavity, large tumors, a large number of ascites), can not be cooperated with the patient (such as psychiatric patients, pediatric patients), pediatric), etc.
Patients with these conditions are prone to neurological damage, serious systemic complications or life-threatening situations if they undergo “hemianesthesia”.
Therefore, for patients who are not suitable for “half anesthesia”, general anesthesia is often used as an alternative.
Local anesthesia: more “accurate”, where the surgery where anesthesia
Local anesthesia, also known as local anesthesia, refers to the application of local anesthetic to a local part of the patient’s body, so that the local pain stimulation of the nerve conduction function is temporarily blocked.
People often come into contact with the local anesthesia situations are? Such as tooth extraction, gastroscopy before drinking a vial of local anesthetic, the body of local superficial swelling removal, upper extremity surgery, foot surgery, etc., often use local anesthesia method.
Local anesthesia is simple and easy to perform, with fewer complications and less impact on the patient’s physiological function, but the applicable surgeries are also very limited.
Therefore, different anesthesia methods have their own applicable surgeries, and anesthesiologists also choose anesthesia methods according to the patient’s disease and surgical conditions. In most cases, surgeries that are not suitable for “half anesthesia” and local anesthesia can be replaced by general anesthesia so as to carry out the surgeries.