ANAESTHESIA ISSUES IN EMERGENCY SITUATIONS

• Choose suitable anaesthetic technique that best fits
  - Patient’s condition
  - Surgeon’s needs
  - Your own experience, skill
• Most cases are full-stomach emergencies; general anaesthesia will normally require protection of lungs with tracheal tube
• Seeing stomach contents in the unprotected airway of an unconscious patient is probably the worst thing that can happen in the practice of anaesthesia
• Do not let this happen to you!
• Where facilities for anaesthesia are limited, ventilators often do not have alarms warning of disconnection
• Trained, experienced anaesthetists are not available
• Emergency surgery under general anaesthesia in these conditions is safer when performed with patient breathing spontaneously