On the more mundane front, advances in anesthesiology might also help with treatments for insomnia—but not in the ways one might think.
Traditional treatments often work on the same mechanisms as the drugs given to anesthetize patients before surgery, thus helping people conk out, but not necessarily replicating normal sleep patterns. By taking a closer look at the mechanisms at work during general anesthesia—and how some of the more widely prescribed sleeping meds behave in the brain—"we can ask 'is that the way we want to [treat insomnia]?'" Brown explains.
And those advances in turn could feed back into the field of anesthesiology, helping to reduce side effects of general anesthesia, such as postoperative cognitive decline. Better understanding of the coma-like state of general anesthesia could also shed light on patients who are in a more permanent vegetative state, who upon waking go through very similar stages as those coming up from general anesthesia—albeit much more slowly. The key, says Brown, is "taking time to understand these mechanisms" and applying them to fine tune the proverbial hammer—a challenge that he and his colleagues hope to announce progress on in the coming months.
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11 Comments
Add Commentgood to know this. now i am more terrified going under for surgery.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisReally fascinating. Question: what happens to the electrical states in the brain Vs biochemical? I'm thinking about micro, not macro as in EEG monitoring.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt would be helpful if the difference between a coma and sleep were explained. I appreciate that they are different but those differences seem to be key to this article so a little summary would have been worth while.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWell the idiot who killed Michael Jackson certainly didn't understand. Using a general anesthetic like propofol to help someone sleep is idiotic and obviously dangerous. If you have heard the term drug induced coma (DIC) for brain injury, it is clear that not being awake isn't the same as sleeping. Brain activity is severely depressed during GA (general anesthesia) but at times very active during the 5 or so stages of sleep. During a head injury a DIC is supposed to greatly limit the metabolism of the brain, sleep does not. How this became news is the real mystery. I would hope that most doc's if not all would know that GA is not the same as sleep.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt might be nice if the surgical team actually divulged to the putative patient what is going on.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this'Pump head" is hardly news... and telling people that anesthesia is likely to result in nigh-on-to-permanent brain damage.... is not a "side effect".. but a serious danger.
But, of course... this would tend to make people less likely to indulge in vastly expensive and money-making procedures.... that also "just happen" to boost the egos of notably egostistical surgeons.
We already know from the studies done by Tversky and Kahneman on the psychology of choice that "doctors" are among those who are utterly lacking in objectivity in desision-making,, including, and most alarmingly.. in their field of suppsoed expertise.
Those in the world of finance, banking, taxation and con-artistry also know this to be true... there is no one so obtusely unable to make sensible decisions in money-matters than your "typical doctor or dentist".
Among other reasons.. this is why our healthcare systems hemorrhage money.. and we commonly see those who hold "extra good health care coverage" to be basket cases of medical intervention which tends to only require still more of the same.
Well, wish I hadn't read this! I have been under a couple of times and believed it was not as serious as described in this article. Too bad I have bad genetics! Best of luck to everyone who need GA!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Traditional treatments often work on the same mechanisms as the drugs given to anesthetize patients before surgery..."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI'm interested in what the exceptions to "often" are.
Your statement is indeed very thrue.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOnly a half witted person should use propofol as a remedy for curing insomnia!
Propofol is for profesional use only, and then an excelent drug for anaesthesiainduction.
Poorly educated and bitter, what a nice combination you have made of yourself. Other than hating surgeons, do you have anything useful to say?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"I'm interested in what the exceptions to "often" are."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"It would be helpful if the difference between a coma and sleep were explained."
"what happens to the electrical states in the brain Vs biochemical?"
Three or four more paragraphs and this article might have been worth reading.
I agree with this article. I have had full anaesthesia on
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisa number of occasions. As side effects for a time afterwards I have difficulty remembering words it normally takes up to 3 months to come right. In addition
my blood sugar level go crazy and exceed the norm. I am still monitoring my sugar level more than 2 months after the last medical procedure. Should I be concerned about this?
Serge Dumont