Going into hospital for surgery can be a daunting prospect for anybody.

Imagine, going into hospital, being wheeled away from your family and into an operating theatre. The surgeons and nurses are in full scrubs and masks. The Anaesthetist comes over and you are put to sleep, ready for your surgery.

Now imagine that you aren’t actually asleep. Your eyes are shut. You can’t move. You can’t speak. You can hear the noise in the theatre and the surgeons talking. You want to tell them what is happening but, no matter how hard you try, you can’t. Then you feel the incision. You feel the pain and that overwhelming fear that you are going to be able to feel and hear then entire operation…

Accidental Awareness whilst under General Anaesthetic (AAGA) or Anaesthesia Awareness are the common names given to the situation when a patient becomes aware of some, or all, events during surgery or a procedure when under a general anaesthetic - often being unable to communicate this with the surgical team.

But what causes Anaesthesia Awareness? Some examples include, failure to calculate the correct dose of anaesthesia, failure to administer the correct drugs, faulty equipment and/or a failure to monitor the patient during the procedure to check for signs of awareness. Anaesthetists are present during the entire surgery when you are given a general anaesthetic and they will monitor you throughout to try to ensure that awareness does not occur. Despite that, on occasion, mistakes can still happen and this could be the result of medical negligence.

In reality, events of Anaesthesia Awareness are rare – it is widely reported that around 1 or 2 patients in every 1,000 patients experience some kind of awareness during a general anaesthetic. That is roughly only 0.1% - 0.2%. The most common examples of surgeries to encounter Anaesthesia Awareness include caesarean sections, chest surgery (thoracic surgery) and heart surgery (cardiac surgery) which typically require lower doses of anaesthetic.

Patients who suffer from Anaesthesia Awareness often complain of feeling helpless during the procedure. Some, not all, complain that they have experienced pain. Some patients remember thinking that they were dead. Unfortunately, the effects of the incident often don’t end when the patient wakes from their procedure. A lot of patients suffer from anxiety attacks, difficulty sleeping and flashbacks or nightmares for long periods of time after an incident of Anaesthesia Awareness. Some patients develop post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD) and require psychological treatment and counselling (Royal College of Anaesthetists).

If you think that you have suffered from an episode of Anaesthesia Awareness, Jackson Lees are here to try to help. Whilst awareness during anaesthesia is rare, the consequences can be extremely distressing for the patient. We can do our best to try to find answers for you as to why the awareness has happened. If the evidence points to a medical negligence claim, we will pursue it for you and that could result in compensation for you to help provide psychological treatment to help overcome any injuries suffered as a result of the awareness.

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