The Impact of Anesthetics Drugs on Memory and Memory Modulation under General Anesthesia

A significant endpoint of general anesthesia is the loss of memory, indeed a terrible complication of narcosis is the anesthesia awareness (AA), a rare condition that occurs when surgical patients can recall their surroundings or an event related to their surgery while they are under general anesthesia (GA). During GA the amnesia is mostly achieved with general anesthetic drugs (endovenous and inhaled), nevertheless different classes of drugs administered can impact the memory. Starting from a brief description of the recent knowledge on the AA phenomenon, this work focuses on the relationship between GA and memory, the pharmacodynamic mechanisms of amnesia induced by anesthetic drugs, as well as the possibility of memory modulation during GA. Benzodiazepines (BDZs) are a complex class of drugs with significant effects on anterograde memory, however in this paper we also discuss on a their hypothetical effect on retrograde memory, even in anesthetized patients.