Expert: Ronald Levy, M.D. - 3/28/2009

Question
I am 27 years old and have an extensive medical history which include 4 major surgeries and numerous minor ones.  The only problem I ever noticed was it took me longer to come out of anesthesia the longer I was under.  I had an endoscopy a few years ago and while in recovery my oxygen dropped no one thought it was a problem never thought about it again until last week.  I had surgery for De Quervain's release performed under MAC.  After the surgery I was unresponsive and my hands started turning blue and were cold to the touch.  My oxygen levels dropped to high 70's low 80's and I was on oxygen.  Was this just a bad reaction to this round of anesthesia or should I be concerned for any future surgeries.

Answer
It is always true that the longer the surgery, the longer it takes to wake up (anesthetic gets stored in the muscle and fat so it takes longer for it to get out of your system). That does not explain the low sats, etc which was probably due to giving you too much sedation so you stopped breathing. So it's not a bad reaction (it's a normal reaction to too much medication).


Ronald Levy, MD
Professor of Anesthesiology
UTMB-Galveston