Lecture 25 - Anaesthetics Flashcards
What are the 2 main methods that anaesthetics act?
General
Local
What are the 2 ways by which general anaesthesia can be administered?
Inhaled or volatile
Intravenous
What are the ways by which local anaesthesia is given?
Regionally so injection
What is conscious sedation?
When a small amount of anaesthetic or benzodiazepines to produce a sleepy-like state
What type of drug is give as a premedication (to help calm a patient down before surgery) for anaesthesia?
Hypnotic-benzodiazepine
How can you induce anaesthesia?
IV
Inhalational
What type of drug is often given as an Intra operative analgesic?
Opioid like fentanyl
What type of drug needs to be given to allow for intubation?
Muscle relaxant
What drugs need to be given to a patient after surgery?
Reverse muscle relaxants so can breathe again
Post op analgesia
Anti-emetic
How does inhaational volatile general anaesthesia work?
Liquid containing anaesthetic gets vaporised into a gas and so gets delivered to lungs via an agent specific vaporiser
What is the most common anaesthetic delivered intravenously to induce anaesthesia?
Propofol
Barbiturates
Etomidate
Ketamine
What are some gases/volatiles that can be delivered to induce anaesthetics?
Xenon
Fluorxene
Halothane
Nitrous oxide (N2O)
Chloroform
Desflurane
What are the 3 main features that are observed as a patient goes under anaesthesia?
Muscle tone
Breathing
Eye movement
Guedels signs
What are the 4 stages of anaesthesia? (Guedels signs)
1 = analgesia and consciousness (muscle normal and slight eye movement)
2 = uncosncosius, erratic breathing, delirium (moderate eye movment and increased muscle tone)
3 = surgical anaesthesia muscles become increasingly relaxed and eye movment. Becomes zero
4 = flaccid muscles, respiratory paralysis
What is achieved in anaesthesia?
Analgesia
Hypnosis (loss of consciousness)
Depression of spinal reflexes
Muscle relaxes
As anaesthetic concentration increases, what repsonse are lost first to last?
First:
Memory
Consciousness
Movement
Cardiovascualr response
Last
How do you measure potentcy of a volatile aneasthetic?
MAC
Minimum Alveolar Concentration
What is Minimum Alveolar Concentration (MAC)?
The alveolar concentration of a volatile anaesthetic at which 50% of patients fail to move to a surgical stimulus
How is the concentration of volatile anaesthetic in the alveoli at equilibrium related to the conc at the spinal cord?
They are equal
What is the anatomical site/substrate for MAC (Minimum ALveolar Concentrtation)?
Spinal cord
What values determine how fast induction and recovery will be?
BLood:Gas partition coefficient (measure of solubility/how it partitions into the blood)
What partition coefficient determines the potentcy of an anaesthetic?
Oil:Gas partition
(How it partitions into fat)
What are some factors affecting Minimum Alveolar Concentration of a volatile anaesthetic?
Age (high in infants, low in elderly)
Hyperthermia (inc)
Hypothermia (dec)
Pregancy (inc)
Alcoholism (inc)
Central stimulants (inc)
Other anaesthetics and sedatives (dec)
Opioids (dec)
Why is Nitrous Oxide often added to other volatile anaesthetics?
To reduce the required dosing/ MAC