Anaesthesia and intensive care
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Anaesth Intensive Care · Feb 1992
ReviewAnaesthesia and the 'inert' gases with special reference to xenon.
Xenon has many of the properties of the ideal anaesthetic agent and has been proposed as a suitable replacement for nitrous oxide in routine clinical anaesthesia. Xenon, krypton and argon are chemically inert under most circumstances, yet all have anaesthetic properties. ⋯ Because of this property, xenon has an important place in the history of the development of theories of anaesthetic action and of concepts such as MAC. Cost is likely to be a major impediment to the regular use of xenon.
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Anaesth Intensive Care · Feb 1992
Comparative StudyInter-ethnic differences in postoperative pethidine requirements.
A preliminary study of 24 hours' postoperative analgesia using a patient-controlled analgesia technique was undertaken in eight European and fourteen Asian adult patients. All patients had upper abdominal surgery and received weight-related doses of pethidine postoperatively via a Cardiff Palliator. ⋯ The Asian patients made 24% fewer demands for analgesia and had a smaller mean (SD) pethidine consumption, 7.62 (2.04) mg.kg-1, compared with the European patients, 9.97 (2.14) mg.kg-1, (P less than 0.05) during the first 24 hours. Further research is necessary to determine whether the smaller requirement for analgesia in Asian patients is a result of pharmacokinetic or pharmacodynamic differences.
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Fentanyl is commonly used as an adjunct to general anaesthesia for day-surgery procedures. We have prospectively studied the effect of this practice on postoperative analgesia in 304 day-surgery patients, 164 undergoing termination of pregnancy and 140 having various other minor gynaecological procedures. Approximately half the patients received fentanyl, the mean dose being 50 mcg. Fentanyl given during anaesthesia had no effect during recovery on analgesic requirements or on nausea or vomiting in either pregnant or non-pregnant patients.