Expert: Ronald Levy, M.D. - 5/14/2007

Question
I am doing a research paper at my college, and there is not a lot of information on-line.  Can you please answer the following questions?  What exact is Sevoflorine?  What is it made up of?  Can you please tell me the normal effects (how long it takes to put someone to sleep, duration, and etc)?  What are the dangers or side effects?  How widely used is Sevoflorine?  Thank you very much...Bobby

Answer
The easiest thing to do is give you a link to the prescribing information. Basically, Sevofluorane is an inhaled anesthetic agent that has replaced Halothane as the inhalation agent of choice for inhaled inductions. It takes about 2 minutes to go to sleep and 5-10 minutes to wake up after turning it off. It is very widely used and the side effects are listed in the link below.

http://www.rxabbott.com/pdf/ultanepi.pdf

Hope this helps,

Ronald Levy, MD
Associate Professor of Anesthesiology
UTMB-Galveston