Anaesthesia

Anesthesia is a condition of loss of sensation of a part of the body or on the whole. It just stops the feeling of pain as well as other sensations. It is used to relieve the patient from pain during surgeries. Anesthesia can be administered in different ways. It can be a local one, general one or a regional one.

General Anesthesia

General anesthetic is the sedative that given, usually as gas or by injection, during some operations surgeries. General anesthetic makes one completely lose his consciousness so that the surgery can be done without pain. It depresses the body’s central nervous system.

The type of GS used depends on the nature of the surgery and the time the patient must be unconscious. Anesthetics are usually very safe. Those people with very poor health must be very careful. A one night stay at the hospital is suggested after administering GA.

Before surgery, the following preparations can be made;

• Give up smoking weeks before the surgery.
• Reduce your weight, if obese, to avoid risks.
• Take care not to have loose teeth.
• Visit the doctor in case of long term medications.

After the operation

After the surgery, pain relieving medicines will be given to the patient in the recovery room.

General anesthetic and children

Talk to the children about the details of anesthesia in simple words as they can understand and keep them prepared. This will prove to be helpful while they are administered with anesthesia

Local anesthesia

This type of anesthesia is used by dentists, physicians and surgeons to perform a small operation on only a small area in your body, for example removing your teeth, brain surgery and minor surgeries like removing moles.

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It causes a loss of feeling to the part of the body where it is administered, since it blocks the nerves on the affected part, thereby preventing the pain signals reaching the brain.

Regional anesthesia

Regional anesthesia is used to perform surgeries on deeper parts of your body, by injecting the medicine near the nerves which transmit the pain signals.

The two most popular types of regional anesthesia are the spinal anesthesia and the epidural anesthesia.

Spinal anesthesia is the major regional anesthesia. It is injected between two vertebrae on the lower back into the fluid in between the discs. This results in a complete loss of feeling from the point of injecting down the body as it blocks the spinal nerves that are nearby.

Epidural anesthesia is a type of regional anesthesia which is used during childbirth to relieve pain so as to stay conscious in the course of the entire procedure. It is also used in hip and knee surgeries.

Epidural anesthesia is suitable for some operations. It can be used for the following:

• knee and hip surgery,
• surgery to reconstruct arteries in the lower legs,
• amputation of the lower limbs,
• operations on the bladder or genitals.
• surgery for hernias , piles and varicose veins.

It can also be used as analgesic to relieve the pain that happened form the surgeries performed under GA.