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Awareness During Anaesthesia

If you or a member of your family has experienced anaesthetic awareness caused by medical negligence during a surgical procedure, our specialist personal injury lawyers may be able to help you claim compensation. Contact us today on 0800 032 8511 for claim advice, or by completing a claim enquiry form online.

General Anaesthetic
Anaesthetic Awareness

What Causes Anaesthetic Awareness?
Making a Clinical Negligence Claim
Compensation
Our Clinical Negligence Lawyers

General Anaesthetic

General anaesthetic is used during many surgical procedures to induce controlled unconsciousness. This is designed to prevent the patient from suffering any pain and generally includes a muscle relaxant to relax the body and make the operation possible.

The type and dosage of general anaesthetic that a patient requires is calculated using a number of factors, including their age, weight and medical history.

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Anaesthetic Awareness

As techniques have become more refined in recent years, anaesthetists have aimed to keep the depth of anaesthesia to a minimum to reduce the risk of complications and side effects, as deeper levels of unconsciousness can be more dangerous.

Generally, anaesthetists are extremely careful in their work and carry out tests to ensure that the anaesthetic has been effective before allowing an operation to commence. Unfortunately however, there are some cases of “anaesthetic awareness”, where a person is aware of things happening around them and can feel pain and sensations, but is unable to move or communicate. This can be terrifying for the patient, leading in some cases to long-term psychiatric effects, including Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

Our lawyers have extensive experience in dealing with compensation claims for anaesthetic awareness. This includes cases where insufficient measures have been taken by the medical staff to ensure that the patient is fully unconscious or they have failed to monitor them effectively for signs of distress (sharp increases in heart rate for example).

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What Causes Anaesthetic Awareness?

There are various reasons why awareness during anaethesia can occur.  Sometimes it can be attributed to human error, for example a miscalculation may mean that a patient is not given enough anaesthetic to keep them unconscious for the duration of a procedure.  Failure to notice warning signs that a patient may be regaining consciousness (such as increased heart rate or blood pressure) can also lead to awareness.

Malfunctions in the equipment that delivers or monitors anaesthesia can also be a cause of anaesthetic awareness, for example if there is a leak in tubing or a pump is not functioning as it should.

Circumstances where anaesthetic awareness is more likely to occur include the 'light' anaesthesia sometimes used in procedures such as emergency caesarian sections (to avoid harming the baby).  If the anesthetist misjudges the depth of anaesthesia, the patient may become aware.

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Making a Clinical Negligence Claim

The assistance of a specialist lawyer can be invaluable, as making a clinical negligence claim is often complicated. They can collate all of the relevant evidence and the best course of action.

People who have experienced anaesthetic awareness can suffer ongoing psychological problems affecting their quality of life, in addition to the pain and trauma at the time of their operation.  They may also develop a phobia of hospitals or doctors, affecting any future treatment that they require.

In every case, medical evidence will be required. It is necessary to show that the person you are making a claim against owed you a duty of care, that they breached that duty of care (what is known in law as negligence), and that the resulting problem was a reasonably foreseeable consequence of that negligence.

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Compensation

There are two elements to a compensation award. The first is called general damages and is financial compensation for the pain and suffering you may have gone through and what is known as loss of amenity. This can include an award for your inability to do things after the medical accident that you used to be able to do before, eg, play sports, drive, carry out housework etc. The award for loss of amenity can be for a short period after the anaesthetic awareness or for ever if that is what the medical evidence supports.

The second element of a compensation award is for your losses and expenses and is known as special damages. It is important to keep receipts for any expenditure you have related to the medical accident, so that these can be reclaimed. The aim is to put you back in a position financially as if the anaesthesic awareness had never occurred.

An award in a clinical negligence case is based on the negligent treatment effects that you would not have had if the treatment had been a success. There may be information available on previous awards in similar cases. Very often, clinical negligence cases are settled out of court.

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Our Clinical Negligence Lawyers

The Legal Line lawyers are experts in all areas of personal injury, with extensive experience in recovering compensation for the victims of clinical negligence. They can provide specialist claim advice, assistance and guidance in helping you to pursue your claim to the best possible outcome.

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