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HX and Scope of Anaesthesia
HX and Scope of Anaesthesia
• Anesthesia, or anaesthesia ("without sensation"), has traditionally meant the condition of having sensation
(including the feeling of pain) blocked or temporarily taken away. It is a pharmacologically induced reversible
state of amnesia , analgesia, loss of responsiveness, loss of skeletal muscle and/or decreased stress response.
• This allows patients to undergo surgery and other procedures without the distress and pain they would
otherwise experience.
• Another definition is a "reversible lack of awareness," whether this is a total lack of awareness (e.g. a general
anesthetic) or a lack of awareness of a part of the body such as a spinal anesthetic or another nerve block
would cause.