General anaesthesia (or general anesthesia) is a medically induced coma and loss of protective reflexes resulting from the administration of one or more general anaesthetic agents. A variety of medications may be administered, with the overall aim of ensuring sleep, amnesia, analgesia, relaxation of skeletal muscles, and loss of control of reflexes of the autonomic nervous system. The optimal combination of these agents for any given patient and procedure is typically selected by an anaesthesiologist or another provider such as an anaesthesiologist assistant or nurse anaesthetist, in consultation with the patient and the medical or dental practitioner performing the operative procedure.
Read more about General Anaesthesia: History, Purpose, Biochemical Mechanism of Action, Preanaesthetic Evaluation, Premedication, Stages of Anaesthesia, Induction, Maintenance, Emergence, Postoperative Care, Perioperative Mortality
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“We have wasted our spirit in the regions of the abstract and general just as the monks let it wither in the world of prayer and contemplation.”
—Alexander Herzen (1812–1870)