A response to ‘Vegetarian anaesthesia’, Krishna G M, Anaesthesia 2003; 58: 501.

Thyroid surgery under local anaesthesia: an alternative to general anaesthesia

Background: Local Anaesthesia is now being accepted universally as a safe alternative to general anaesthesia for thyroid surgery. Aim: This study was carried out to compare the outcomes of patients undergoing thyroid surgery under local and general anaesthesia. Material and Methods: Hundred patients who underwent thyroid surgery for benign and malignant diseases under local and general anaesthe...

Allergy to local anaesthesia.

A 35-year-old female had severe anaphylactoid reactions to pnlocaine and lignocaine on separate occasions Intradermal testing was positive to serial dilutions of both drugs and negative to bupivacaine, which was subsequently used uneventfully While intradermal testing for local anaesthetic allergy has limited application it would appear that when such te*ts are positive in high dilution they ma...

Physics Applied to Anaesthesia

Crisis management during anaesthesia: awareness and anaesthesia.

BACKGROUND Patient awareness during general anaesthesia has considerable potential for severe emotional distress in the patient as well as professional, personal, and financial consequences for the anaesthetist. OBJECTIVES To examine the role of a previously described core algorithm "COVER ABCD-A SWIFT CHECK", supplemented by a specific sub-algorithm for awareness, in the detection and manage...

Effects of xenon anaesthesia on the circulatory response to hypoventilation.

BACKGROUND Circulatory response to hypoventilation is aimed at eliminating carbon dioxide and maintaining oxygen delivery (DO(2)) by increasing cardiac output (CO). The hypothesis that this increase is more pronounced with xenon than with isoflurane anaesthesia was tested in pigs. METHODS Twenty pigs received anaesthesia with xenon 0.55 MAC/remifentanil 0.5 microg kg(-1) min(-1) (group X, n=1...