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Continuing Education in Anaesthesia, Critical Care & Pain 2006 6(2):67-70; doi:10.1093/bjaceaccp/mkl004
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Continuing Education in Anaesthesia, Critical Care & Pain | Volume 6 Number 2 2006 © The Board of Management and Trustees of the British Journal of Anaesthesia [2006]. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Injury during anaesthesia

Shruti Contractor, MA MRCS
Senior House Officer, Division of Anaesthesia and Intensive Care, University Hospital Nottingham NG7 2UH, UK

Jonathan G Hardman, BMed Sci BM BS DM FANZCA FRCA
Clinical Senior Lecturer & Honorary Consultant, Division of Anaesthesia and Intensive Care, University Hospital Nottingham NG7 2UH, UK Tel: +44 0 115 970 9229 Fax: +44 0 115 970 0739 E-mail: j.hardman@nottingham.ac.uk (for correspondence)
The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.


Key points

Many injuries sustained during anaesthesia are due to human error and may be avoided through high standards of clinical practice.

Dental injury occurs during 1% of general anaesthetics and is the commonest cause for litigation against anaesthetists.

Peripheral nerve injury is usually due to poor patient positioning during general anaesthesia or to intra-neural injection during regional anaesthesia.

Ocular injury occurs during 0.1% of general anaesthetics, and is usually corneal. Blindness occurs following 1 in 125 000 (0.0008%) general anaesthetics.

Muscular and cutaneous injuries are commonest in the elderly and debilitated; they may be fatal in these patients.

 

Iatrogenic injury is a broad term that may be defined as ‘harm, hurt, damage or impairment that results from the activities of a doctor.’1 This includes physical injuries, adverse drug reactions, drug errors, surgical mishaps and adverse outcomes associated with equipment failure. Some causes of iatrogenic injury are difficult to avoid, . . . [Full Text of this Article]


   Injuries during airway management
 
Dental

Lips and oropharyngeal mucous membrane

Tracheobronchial injuries

Vocal cords

Sore throat

Oesophageal injuries


   Nerve injury
 

   Ophthalmic injuries
 

   Skin and muscle injury
 
Skin injury

Alopecia

Tourniquets

Burns


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