Mention surgery to any one and the first fear is that of pain (naturally). We now have a new technique which can make a surgery a cake walk. Whenever I did a knee replacement surgery I used a spinal anesthetic and that meant the patient had a tube inserted for urination. This would be a potential for infection. The spinal anesthetic wears off in 2 hours and then the pain would start. This delayed the recovery as well. He hospital stay got longer. To address these issues we now use nerve blocks! A sonography machine is used by the anesthesiologist to locate the nerves which would conduct the painful stimuli from the surgical site. Once the nerve is localized it is blocked by injecting a powerful local anesthetic drug. A small tube (as big as your hair) is then kept near the nerve and is connected to a pump. This pump delivers the same local anesthetic continuously (just like the drip irrigation you see I the farms!). he surgery is then conducted under a short general anesthesia and you wake up post surgery with no pain! The surgical pain is usually felt for first 48 hours and hence he drip – irrigation is used for 48 hours! Since the pain is less the recovery is faster. There is no need to use a urinary tube since the patient has only one leg blocked for pain. There is decreased risk of infection and most of the patients go home in 4 days time. And it does not cost any extra money!
So it is a win0win situation for everybody. Most of the surgeries are done under these blocks now and hence always ask your surgeon whether you are suitable for a block!
So it is a win0win situation for everybody. Most of the surgeries are done under these blocks now and hence always ask your surgeon whether you are suitable for a block!
