Featured Image Credit: ABC
For some people, anesthesiophobia is a genuine fear. Whereas tomophobia is a general fear of surgery, anesthesiophobia is a more niche one that can involve people suffering from anxiety or panic over fears that they're losing control, they might accidentally remain awake, or never wake up. While medical professionals are here to guide you through the procedure and assure you that there's largely nothing to worry about, one doctor has given us the inside scoop on what really happens when you go under.
There are many reasons why someone needs to undergo anesthesia, with it typically being used to block nerve signals to the brain that cause pain. After all, we don't imagine many of you want to feel yourselves going under the knife of open-heart surgery.
Over on YouTube, Dr. Daniel Medel explains how the video is purely for entertainment purposes, but hopes to enlighten people on exactly what happens when you're told to count sheep by a doctor or nurse.
He says that the movies don't really represent anesthesia properly, stating that things are actually stranger and more choreographed. Saying it's not quite sleep and it's not quite death, he describes anesthesia as 'time travel’, but you can only jump forward.
Advert
Expanding on this 'reversible off switch for your nervous system', Medel reveals how there are three types of anesthesia. Local anesthesia will numb small areas, like when you go to the dentist for a tooth removal, regional anesthesia that numbs a bigger zone, like an arm, and general anesthesia, which is the big one that effectively knocks you out.
There are three basic components of anesthesia. Analgesia reduces pain or eliminates it altogether, amnesia wipes your memory of feeling any pain, and a muscle relaxant paralyzes you.
Instead of turning off your brain like a lightbulb, Medel compares general anesthesia to a series of 'network outages'. Brain scans of those under anesthesia are different from those of people who are asleep, with typical brain cycles being disrupted or completely absent.
There are rare cases of intraoperative awareness where a patient wakes up during surgery, but as Medel reminds us, it's an occasional complication.
For those who think it's a case of an anesthesiologist simply putting you under and leaving the room, he reiterates that they're crucial in monitoring your vitals, adjusting drug levels by the second, and looking out for subtle changes in your body.
When it comes to waking up, Medel explains how your brain's networks come back sporadically, which is what gives you the groggy feeling of confusion. It's also why you might say wild or unfiltered things as your brain struggles to connect with what's going on.
If you're worried about the risks, Medel states that modern anesthesia is extremely safe in healthy patients. Those with heart, lung, or neurological issues need to be more careful, while there are some post-operation cognitive issues in older patients.
He concludes by saying: "It's one of the few times in life where we literally hand over our existence to another person, trusting they'll return us safely. And the fact that they almost always do, I think that's pretty amazing."
