Masui. The Japanese journal of anesthesiology
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Although suppression of thermoregulatory mechanisms by anesthetics is generally assumed, the extent to which thermoregulatory responses are active during general anesthesia is not known. To evaluate the effect of anesthetics on thermoregulation, we investigated the threshold body core temperatures to induce peripheral cutaneous vasoconstriction and shivering in spontaneously breathing rabbits. Rabbits are anesthetized with halothane at 0.05, 0.2 and 0.4 MAC (minimum alveolar concentration). ⋯ However, the incidence of shivering was significantly decreased by halothane dose-dependently. Threshold of shivering (37.3 +/- 0.8 degrees C) was significantly lower than that of peripheral cutaneous vasoconstriction (38.9 +/- 1.1 degrees C). We conclude that the halothane can exert an influence on shivering.