Now That's Kind of Scary

Monday, February 21, 2005

Daily Pundit shares an interesting factoid about anesthetics found here:

Although more than 150 years have past since the discovery of general anesthetics, how they precisely work remains a mystery. Biophysicists at the Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York may be close to solving this riddle.

Huping Hu and Maoxin Wu have proposed a mechanism that may lead to better, safer anesthetics, a revolution in the treatment of pain, and a more complete understanding of the effects of alcohol on brain function. General (as opposed to local) anesthetics affect a variety of neurotransmitter receptors.

However, a universally accepted mechanism of anesthesia remains elusive. Presently, two schools of thought exist. The "lipid theory" proposes that anesthetics interact directly with cell membranes that are involved in brain functions. The "protein theory" suggests that anesthetics directly interact with cell proteins such as the ion channels and receptors that are involved in neurotransmission. Neither concept is supported by direct experimental evidence.

If this sort of thing interests you... then read the whole thing which describes how doctors think they work. Personally what I find scary is that we've been using them for this long and still don't know how they work... especially since they think they put your brain into a form of hypoxia (oxygen deprivation). Kinda makes you rethink going under the knife doesn't it?

Posted at 10:50 AM by Nick | | |

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Comments:

I could be very wrong here, but my piano teacher (whose sister is an anaesthesiologist at a major teaching hospital here) described her sister's work as poisoning a person into a coma. This sister also practices acupuncture, as there apparently is a lot to that as well.

After having come out of anaesthesia sicker than a dog, and having had two animals die from anaesthesia, I am fearful to the point of avoiding the doctor on some problems that would require a possible surgical solution.

Posted at February 21, 2005 12:44 PM by