Premium
Peri‐operative dreaming and awareness in children
Author(s) -
HOBBS A. J.,
BUSH G. H.,
DOWNHAM D. Y.
Publication year - 1988
Publication title -
anaesthesia
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.839
H-Index - 117
eISSN - 1365-2044
pISSN - 0003-2409
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2044.1988.tb06687.x
Subject(s) - medicine , anesthesia , muscle relaxant , incidence (geometry) , nitrous oxide , arousal , prospective cohort study , peri , perioperative , surgery , physics , neuroscience , optics , biology
Summary Dreaming under anaesthesia was investigated in a prospective study of 120 day case paediatric patients, aged 5–17 years, who underwent a variety of surgical procedures. Patients were anaesthetised using the ‘Liverpool technique’ of paediatric anaesthesia (nitrous oxide‐oxygen‐relaxant). No patient reported awareness, but 23 of 120 patients (19%) reported dreams. Analysis of the data revealed that the choice of muscle relaxant, (nondepolarising or depolarising) had a statistically significant effect on the incidence of dreaming (p < 0.05). It is suggested that the technique of intermittent intravenous suxamethonium may result in increased muscle spindle discharge and cause cerebral arousal and an increased incidence of dreaming.