Expert: Ronald Levy, M.D. - 5/19/2009

Question
It has been almost a week since I had an outpatient surgery under general anesthesia. I am taking only Motrin because the pain meds were making me sick, or so I thought. I am still light-headed and cannot sit upright for more than 30 minutes at a time without getting dizzy and wanting to vomit. Before I went under for my surgery, it felt like my brain was thrown into a hot frying pan. IS this normal? I called the doctor and they said the drugs should be out of my system by now... What could be causing this

Answer
It would be hard to answer (not knowing what surgery, your medical history, anesthetic record, etc). The meds are out of your system so I doubt it is related to that. It might be related to the type of surgery you had. I don't understand the "hot frying pan" analogy. I have not heard that one.

Ronald Levy, MD
Professor of Anesthesiology
UTMB-Galveston