Waste anaesthetic gas exposure in veterinary surgeries: A need for scavenging systems

Extract In recent years the medical profession has shown increasing concern over the potential health hazard of chronic exposure to anaesthetic gases. People engaged in full time veterinary anaesthesia or surgery may be expected to experience exposures similar to those documented among human surgical and anaesthetic personnel (9) Dreesen, D.W., Jones, G.L., Brown, J. and Rawlings, C.O. 1981. Monitoring for trace anaesthetic gases in a veterinary teaching hospital. Am. Vet. Med. Assn. J., 179(8): 191–799. [Google Scholar] (11) Gallagher, L.V. and Klavano, P.A. 1981. Scavenging waste anaesthetic gases from obsolescent machines. Am. Vet. Med. Assn. J., 179(12): 1393–1396. [PubMed] , [Google Scholar] (14) Manley, S.V. and McDonell, W.N. 1980. Anaesthetic pollution and disease. Am. Vet. Med. Assn. J., 176(6): 515–518. [PubMed] , [Google Scholar] (15) Manley, S.V. and McDonell, W.N. 1980. Recommendations for reduction of anaesthetic gas pollution. Am. Vet. Med. Assn. J., 176(6): 519–524. [PubMed] , [Google Scholar] (18) Milligan, J.E., Sablan, J.L. and Short, C.E. 1980. A survey of waste anaesthetic gas concentrations in U.S. Air Force veterinary surgeries. Am. Vet. Med. Assn. J., 177(10): 1021–1022. [PubMed] , [Google Scholar]. However, veterinarians in private practice may have less exposure to trace anaesthetic gases than do surgical teams in human hospitals. Wingfield et al. (25) Wingfield, W.E., Ruby, D.L., Buchan, R.M. and Gunther, B.J. 1981. Waste anaesthetic gas exposures to veterinarians and animal technicians. Am. Vet. Med. Assn. J., 178(4): 399–402. [PubMed] , [Google Scholar] estimated that the mean number of hours per week personnel used inhalation anaesthetics ranged from 1-20 among small animal and mixed practice veterinarians.