A new study has shown that plants react to anesthetics similarly to the way animals and humans do, suggesting plants are ideal objects for testing anesthetics actions in future. A new study published ...

General anesthetics have a more widespread effect on the brain than inducing sleep, suggests a new study that could lead to improved drugs for use in surgery. Share on Pinterest Researchers now ...

Thanks to anesthetics, patients on the operating table “sleep” through their surgery and don’t feel the pain of being cut open—at least, doctors hope. But at the wrong dose, these small molecules can ...

Within a few years after their introduction into widespread clinical use, three major classes of inhaled anesthetics were used: hydrocarbons, ethers, and other (non–carbon-based) gases. Nitrous oxide ...

A new understanding of the complex ways in which general anesthetics act on the brain could eventually lead to improved drugs for surgery. It remains unclear how general anesthesia works, even though ...

Since the mid-19th century, surgeons and their grateful patients have made use of ether and other general anesthetics. Yet exactly how these compounds produce a painfree, unconscious state remains ...

Anesthetics were the drugs that intrigued me the most during my pharmacology classes in pharmacy school. One reason may have been their longevity: we learned that anesthetics were used in ancient ...

Intravenous (i.v.) anesthetics include etomidate, midazolam, propofol, thiopental, ketamine, and opioid agonists. The first four agents act by enhancing the activity of the inhibitory neurotransmitter ...

The first successful public demonstration of the inhalational induction of anesthesia took place in the surgical amphitheater of Massachusetts General Hospital on October 16, 1846. The news spread ...