People Are Just Realising Anaesthesia Doesn't Actually Send You 'To Sleep,' And I Had No Idea

The last time I was at the dentist (four fillings ― I blame my baking problem), I remember thinking to myself, “how was I bored while people were drilling into my teeth?” 

Local anaesthesia (the type that numbers your gums during dental work) binds to sodium channels in your nerve cells which stops them from transmitting impulses, I later learned through amazed online searches.

But to be honest, I’d always thought of general anaesthesia ― “going to sleep” ― as local anaesthesia’s cruder cousin. It simply knocked you out, I reasoned. 

That was until I saw a video from anesthesiologist Dr Anthony Kaveh.

In a recent YouTube Short, he explained: “Anaesthesia is NOT sleep.”

What happens instead?

According to Dr Kaveh, “we give you medication that turns off your brain, making you completely unconscious so you can’t perceive pain.”

He continued, “then we give you some medications that paralyze your body if needed; then we also give some medications to wipe your memory so that you’re less anxious, and so that we minimise the risk of PTSD under anaesthesia.”

Healthcare providers and researchers at the Mayo Clinic confirm on their site that general anaesthesia is not a medication, but rather a few medications. 

Though it brings on a “sleep-like state,” they say, “your brain doesn’t respond to pain signals or reflexes” under those conditions. 

As for the memory-wiping element, the University of Illinois Chicago says that some medications in general anaesthetic prevent your brain from forming new memories while affected. 

They point to research published in the British Journal of Anaesthesia which found that you can even separate the other effects of anaesthesia from its amnesic therapies in mice.

“Many people thought the loss of memory [associated with anaesthesia] was due to the fact that you were asleep, or de-aroused,” Dr Fettiplace, lead author on the study, told the university. “But this is not the case.”

Some scientists even think anaesthesia could have a potential use in helping to “wipe” or lessen bad memories or associations for people with PTSD and phobias.

People were pretty surprised 

Plenty of commenters under Dr Kaveh’s video wrote that they found the information a little scary.

“This is actually more horrifying,” one commenter wrote; “sounds so much more scary when you describe it that way, another said. 

But as yet another YouTube user pointed out, “People say ’omg that sounds horrifying’; but I’ve been under anaesthesia multiple times, it’s fantastic.” 

The NHS points out that general anaesthetic is usually safe and effective. 

However here’s another rabbit hole for you to go down: “It’s not clear exactly how [general anaesthetic] works, but it’s known that all anaesthetics stop the nerves from passing signals to the brain,” they add.