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Paralysis adds to horror of waking up under the knife
Clare Wilson
newscientist.comIf you're facing surgery this may well be your worst nightmare: waking up while under the knife without medical staff realising.
The biggest-ever study of this phenomenon is shedding light on what such an experience feels like – and is causing debate about how best to prevent it.
For one year, starting in 2012, an anaesthetist at every hospital in the UK and Ireland recorded whenever a patient later told a staff member that they had been awake during surgery. They investigated 300 cases by interviewing the patient and doctors involved.
One of the most striking findings, says lead author Jaideep Pandit of Oxford University Hospitals, was that pain was not generally the worst part of the experience – it was paralysis. For some operations, paralysing drugs are given to relax muscles and stop unconscious reflex movements. "Pain was something they understood, but very few of us have experienced what it's like to be paralysed," says Pandit. "They thought they had been buried alive."
"I thought I was about to die," says Sandra, who regained consciousness but was unable to move during a dental operation when she was 12 years old. "It felt as though nothing would ever work again – as though the anaesthetist had removed everything apart from my soul."
The audit, carried out by the Royal College of Anaesthetists and the Association of Anaesthetists of Great Britain and Ireland, found that most episodes of awareness were brief and happened before or after the surgery took place. But waking still caused distress in 51 per cent of cases. As well as paralysis, people reported sensations of pain and choking.
to read more: newscientist.com
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