This is what a study presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Anesthesiologists reveals.
The team evaluated several recent animal studies, the results of which show that often used anesthesias could have neurotoxic effects on the developing brain. In order to establish whether these data would apply to human beings, the research team carried out an analysis on a group of children born in the “Medicaid” program between 1999 and 2000.
Over the course of four years, 625 children under the age of three were exposed to general anesthesia as part of a benign hernia operation. These children were twice as likely to experience developmental and behavioral problems at a later stage than a randomly selected sample of 5,000 children with no medical history related to anesthesia.
Study leader Dr. Sun warns that “since the subjects in this study were all in the Medicaid program, there is a limit to this data. It is quite possible that the demographics of this social group differ from the general population. Indeed, this review only looks at data collected 2-3 years after exposure. More rigorous studies are needed to assess the long-term effects of anesthesia on patient health. children. ”
According to Dr. Sun, these results should be interpreted with caution due to the limitations and preliminary nature of the study. Parents should especially not prevent their children from having necessary surgeries. As Dr. Sun explains, “In addition, animal studies are considered basic science, and the results do not always translate into the complex physiological system of humans.”