Key result
Improvements in anaesthetic and analgesic agents and their delivery systems have reduced anaesthetic death rates from approximately 1 in 1000 in the 1940s to between 1 in 250,000 and 1 in 400,000.
Why the study?
Significant reductions in anaesthetic mortality over 60 years have been achieved, but ongoing improvements in anaesthetic and analgesic agents and delivery warrant review.
Answers are grounded in this paper and cite their sources.
There is a great deal of data to indicate that better knowledge of diseases, better preoperative preparations, better monitoring and better anaesthetics have significantly reduced mortality during general and regional anaesthesia in the past 60 years. Anaesthetic death rates of approximately one in 1000 in the 1940s were reduced to one in 10 000 in the 1970s, and are now estimated to be as low as one in 250 000 to one in 400 000 in 2008. This is about 250 times better that it was just 60 years ago. This paper will focus on the improvements in anaesthetic and analgesic agents and their delivery in the past 20 years and speculate on how these drugs and drug delivery systems will continue to get better in the future.
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TH Stanley (2008) conducted a review in Anaesthesia. Anaesthetic and analgesic agents and delivery systems was evaluated. Improvements in anaesthetic and analgesic agents and their delivery systems have reduced anaesthetic death rates from approximately 1 in 1000 in the 1940s to between 1 in 250,000 and 1 in 400,000.
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