In my musings, I have been trying to understand how anesthesia works. Especially the kind of anesthesia where it's said you are awake and responsive, but have no memory of it afterwards; you have amnesia. I can only think that if this is true, brain cells must have been destroyed, kind of a virtual lobotomy. I have tried to ask anesthesiologists about how this works, but to no avail. They just don't answer. In the mandated pre-surgical "consult" the anesthesiologist wants only to employ her or his skills, namely to render you unconscious so they can get on with their job, and the next patient. I've asked a nurse, and she answered, indicating that the "awake and responsive" is merely a medical term, not meaning what most would think. She had no documentation for her reasoning, however.
Now I read that some are tracing the dementia they are experiencing to the effects of anesthesia. One man says after being administered Versid he lost memory of all that happened for several weeks afterwards. Another claims to have sporadic episodes of dementia which he attributes to surgical anesthesia. Evidently, the relationship between dementia and anesthesia is under study, though it would seem sponsorship of such studies would be hard to come by, certainly not from any of the pharmaceutical or medical communities.
I have always thought that if something can essentially destroy the function of brain cells, how can that function ever be recovered? (During the preparations for my last surgery,when the anesthesiologist was present, as well as several other attendants, I recall those dread white stockings being put on my legs, and then other measures being taken. I asked if this was the part that I would have no memory of later. Someone answered yes, and I said it seems like I would remember. And then nothing. It's probable that I woke up less smart than before.
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