Ketamin in obstetrical anesthesia: Clinical and experimental results.

In the last several years the Phencyclidin derivative Ketamin has been used more andmore clinically in obstetrics äs in other fields. Especially in obstetrics some pharmacological qualities of Ketamin led to the assumption that this substance caused fewer anesthesia-induced sideefFects on mother and child. In the field of obstetrics the ränge of effects and side-effects of an anesthetic influences the process of birth (specifically active labor, and blood flow to the placenta) äs well äs the condition of the fetus in the Uterus and the condition of the newborn infant immediately after birth and illnesses specific to pregnancy, especially toxemia. The first extensive clinical experiences with Ketamin in obstetrical anesthesia resulted in widely diversified reports about the effects of Ketamin on active labor [2, 3, 15, 16]. The heart-frequency of the fetus was not affected by these use of Ketamin [15, 16, 21]. The condition of the neonate immediately after birth was judged to be better than after the use of other anesthetic agents [15, 16, 21]. The positive chronotropic effect of Ketamin and its property of increasing the blood pressure proved useful for inducing anesthesia in hypotonic patients or patients in hemorrhagic shock [18]However, caution in the use of Ketamin seemed indicated with pre-eclamptic or manif estly eclamptic patients [l, 7, 22]. The following reports of experiments with Ketamin deal with: 1. Motility of the Uterus during birth. 2. The effect of Ketamin on placental bloodflow in animal experiments. 3. The clinical comparison of two series of caesarean sections with different methods of inducing anesthesia, and was Curriculum vitae