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The purpose of anesthesia can be distilled down to three basic goals or endpoints: [2]: 236 hypnosis (a temporary loss of consciousness and with it a loss of memory.In a pharmacological context, the word hypnosis usually has this technical meaning, in contrast to its more familiar lay or psychological meaning of an altered state of consciousness not necessarily caused by drugs—see hypnosis).
Leaves of the coca plant (Erythroxylum novogranatense var. Novogranatense), from which cocaine, a naturally occurring local anesthetic, is derived [1] [2]. An anesthetic (American English) or anaesthetic (British English; see spelling differences) is a drug used to induce anesthesia — in other words, to result in a temporary loss of sensation or awareness.
Anesthesiology, anaesthesiology or anaesthesia is the medical specialty concerned with the total perioperative care of patients before, during and after surgery. [1] It encompasses anesthesia, intensive care medicine, critical emergency medicine, and pain medicine. [2]
General anaesthetics (or anesthetics) are often defined as compounds that induce a loss of consciousness in humans or loss of righting reflex in animals. Clinical definitions are also extended to include an induced coma that causes lack of awareness to painful stimuli, sufficient to facilitate surgical applications in clinical and veterinary practice.
The first historical achievement in anesthesia occurred around 4000 BC in ancient Mesopotamia. [5] [10] [32] [33] [34] This was the advent of ethanol (commonly known as drinking alcohol), the first general anaesthetic agent.
The Meyer-Overton correlation for anaesthetics. A nonspecific mechanism of general anaesthetic action was first proposed by Emil Harless and Ernst von Bibra in 1847. [9] They suggested that general anaesthetics may act by dissolving in the fatty fraction of brain cells and removing fatty constituents from them, thus changing activity of brain cells and inducing anaesthesia.
1900. α [6] β [7] [8]: etidocaine: Duranest 1971 (Takman) 1972 (Lund) hexylcaine: Cyclaine, Osmocaine fomocaine [9]ester - phenyl fotocaine [9]hydroxyprocaine [10 ...
General anaesthesia (UK) or general anesthesia (US) is medically induced loss of consciousness that renders a patient unarousable even by painful stimuli. [5] It is achieved through medications, which can be injected or inhaled, often with an analgesic and neuromuscular blocking agent.