由 home-healthhaven 
Anesthesia is a common medical practice used in various procedures, from heart surgery and tumor removal to dental work. Since it’s widely used, it’s important that medical professionals are properly trained to avoid any mistakes. Although deaths due to anesthesia are now extremely rare due to strict standards, training is still essential. If you’re a registered nurse, getting trained in anesthesia, such as at Valley Anesthesia, could be beneficial as you’ll likely encounter its use at some point in your career.
Anesthesiology has been around since the early 1800s. In 1804, Haneoka Seishu used herbal extracts to make a patient unconscious, and not long after, ether became commonly used in medical procedures. While it might seem like anesthesia’s effects are purely physical, it actually has a holistic impact on both the body and mind.
The main aim is to achieve different outcomes with minimal risk to the patient. General anesthesia suppresses the central nervous system, making the patient unconscious and insensitive to pain. Sedation prevents nerve impulses between the cerebral cortex and the limbic system. Conductive anesthesia blocks nerve signals from targeted body parts to the spinal cord. Various drugs like hypnotics, narcotics, and analgesics are used to achieve these effects.
These drugs contribute to anesthesia’s holistic nature. For instance, hypnosis in anesthesia resembles sleep—it not only makes the patient unconscious but also affects memory. Different drugs impact different brain regions, leading to both a loss of consciousness and memory.
We have two types of memory: declarative (facts and verbal information) and non-declarative (skills like driving). Anesthetics affect these memories differently based on the dosage and drug combination, showing that changes in our body can influence how we store information while under anesthesia.
Anesthesia also impacts consciousness, which involves processing and synthesizing information. Interestingly, a patient might have a form of subjective consciousness during a procedure without showing outward signs. Though rare, this suggests a deep connection between the mind and body, even when drugs try to separate the two. Cartesian Dualism, the mind-body problem proposed by Rene Descartes in the 17th century, remains relevant today, proving that consciousness is still a mystery to philosophers, psychologists, and scientists alike. Some even speculate that in the future, we might be able to transfer our consciousness to computers, though this idea is still more science fiction than science fact.
Whether you’re in philosophy, psychology, neuroscience, or nursing, anesthesiology offers fascinating insights into how the body and mind work together. Like many fields of medicine, there’s still much to learn and discover.