If your anesthesiologist and other care providers fail to give you anesthetics before you undergo surgery (or give you inadequate anesthetics), it can result in a traumatic experience. Not just because of the severe pain you can feel when your surgeon begins operating and making incisions, but also the emotional trauma you can go through if this happens. How can something like this happen and when do you have a claim for medical malpractice if this does happen to you or a loved one?
How is Anesthesia Administered?
There are various ways anesthesia can be administered. Two ways to administer it are as an epidural/spinal anesthetic or via general anesthesia. When administering anesthesia epidurally, an epidural catheter/needle will be inserted into an area of your spine. When being put under via general anesthesia you will receive anesthetics as a combination of intravenous medications and gases. You can also receive regional anesthesia for a specific area of your body when only that body part is being operated on – for example surgery to your hand. And for very minor procedures you will receive local anesthesia.
Another factor that can come into play in choosing what anesthetic to administer to you is the timing of your procedure. For example, you may be undergoing a procedure where you typically would receive an epidural anesthetic. However the procedure may need to be emergently done, and there may not be enough time for an epidural anesthetic to take effect. In that instance you may need a general anesthetic. An example of this is the need for an emergency C-Section.
While a failure to either give you anesthetics or a failure to ensure you were given anesthetics before surgery can be traumatic in any instance, this will be most traumatic when you do not receive proper anesthesia for major surgery.
An anesthesiologist does not simply administer your anesthetic. He or she must also test to make sure the anesthetic is taking affect. This is especially important when you are about to undergo surgery. Negligence can include a failure to do a proper skin assessment and other testing to measure the adequacy of the sensory blockade after you receive your anesthetic. Basically, this is testing to make sure the anesthetic is working and you cannot feel anything. Depending on the timing of the surgery, your anesthesiologist may need to use lidocaine anesthetic solution to speed up the onset of sensory blockade.
If your anesthesiologist does their testing correctly, there is usually no reason you should be undergoing surgery without adequate anesthesia. Essentially the fact that you underwent surgery and could feel everything can be strong proof that no testing, or inadequate testing, was done to ensure you were properly anesthetized before having surgery. A failure to give you proper anesthetics will result in a delay in the performance in your surgery while anesthetics are readministered so the surgery can be performed. Depending on the surgery it could also have additional serious harmful effects on you.
Another area of negligence is not receiving sufficient anesthetics and becoming fully awake during surgery (in situations where you were put under via general anesthetics), or regaining feeling in the area your surgeon is operating on (in cases where you receive an epidural or a regional anesthetic). This can result in pain, psychological trauma, and additional significant harm depending on the type of surgery being performed.
The Thistle Law Firm is experienced at handling negligent anesthesia administration claims. If you or a loved one suffered harm due to receiving no anesthesia, or inadequate anesthesia, before surgery the attorneys at the Thistle Law Firm are here to take your call at 215-568-6800.