What Is Anesthesia?

Abstract

Have you ever had surgery? If yes, perhaps you remember how you talked to the hospital staff before the operation, until everything suddenly became black? And when you woke up later, the operation was already finished, and you felt as if you had been asleep? But you were not asleep—you were under anesthesia, a drug-induced state in which you are not aware of your surroundings, do not feel any pain, and cannot move or form memories. Did you know that anesthesia was only discovered 150 years ago? Just imagine how traumatic an operation would have been when there was no anesthesia: people had to go through a surgery wide awake and with no pain killers! Luckily, nowadays we can feel at ease before an operation, knowing we will not experience it or feel any pain—thanks to anesthesia. But what exactly is anesthesia? In this article, we will shed some light on what happens during anesthesia, what different kinds of anesthesia exist and how they work.