Anesthesia
100, 99, 98, 97...
What tonsils, doc?
By ANNE MARIE GADDIS
Of the Emerald
Anesthesia has the alcohol breath tests beat in the amount of
people having difficulty remembering how to count backwards.
“Actually I never remember when I quit counting,” one student says
of the test to see if the effects of anesthesia are complete. Some
students said they couldn’t have made it past 96, while others proudly
testify reaching lows of 93 or 94.
The word anesthesia means insensability and can be the result of
disease, injury, or the administration of anesthetic drugs.
The search for relief of pain during surgery is not new, and it in fact
goes back to before the Christian era when marijuana, alcohol and
opium were used as legal pain killers.
Today, general anesthesia is used for most minor operations. The
anesthetic acts upon the higher centers of the brain to cause insensitiv
ity to pan and physical sensation.
The length of time one is under the anesthetic differs with the type
of operation performed, but “If a person is under anesthesis for an
hour,” says Dr. A.P. Kibby, anesthesiologist at Sacred Heart Hospital,
“often he will awaken within a half hour after the flow is discontinued.”
The “flow” refers to the inhalation technique that is commonly
administered by an anesthesia machine. This is simply an apparatus
that registers the amount of gas flowing per minute, Kibby explains.
Oxygen should accompany the gases flowing into the rubber rebreathing
bag. The patient breathes in and out of this bag by means of connecting
corrugated rubber tubes and a face mask. Between the bag and mask is
a container of soda lime, a granular substance that extracts carbon
dioxide from the exhaled breath.
The smell of the gas was described by student Roy Corpus as
being “really horrible, the stuff they used really stunk!”
It doesn’t require a great number of people to administer the
anesthetic, but instead it “usually requires only one qualified person to
run the machine,” says Kibby.
Sometimes a particular muscle or group of muscles, such as the
abdominal muscles, must be soft and relaxed to insure the safety and
success of the operation, “we sometimes use muscle relaxants in that
case," says Kibby, and “they can be injected pretty effectively in most
cases.”
Contrary to popular belief that the stuff puts you out for hours on
end, Kibby says, “The sleepiness that often occurs after operations is
not usually due to toe actual anesthesia process, but often has to do
with toe pre-medication used before surgery.”
“I woke up very fuzzy,” said Corpus. “In fact, I really felt like the
room wasn’t standing still anymore.”
Several students felt “disoriented” and “fuzzy” when treated with
anesthesia. Most described feeling lightheaded, and kind of “dingy,”
while one student reported being violently ill after becoming conscious.
Some students went as far as to say they really “got off” on the gas
and didn’t mind it at all.
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Recovery
Self-help group offers assistance
to former patients, nervous persons
By CHERI O'NEIL
Of the Emerald
On the spectrum of the mental
system, there are those persons
who have been hospitalized for
mental care and those who are in
need of emotional support; both
are invited to join Recovery, Inc., a
new group meeting in Eugene.
Recovery, the Association of
Nervous and Former Mental Pa
tients, is a systematic self-help
group designed to prevent re
lapses in former mental patients
and to forestall disorders in nerv
ous persons.
Through their Recovery train
ing, says Marian Fox, Oregon and
western Idaho Recovery leader,
members learn to handle the frust
rations and irritations of everyday
life with the practice and encour
agement of other members of the
group who have succeeded in
conquering their fears.
Recovery is a 40-year old in
ternational organization that is
often refered to by Ann Landers or
Dear Abby in dealing with
psychoneurotics, who cannot
cope with everyday functions.
There are 17 Recovery gcoups
in Oregon, and each have an av
erage of 10 participants.
Dr. Abraham Low, the late
psychiatrist and neurologist who
originated the Recovery me
thod, explained the self-help
techniques with his own case his
tories in the book “Mental Health
Through Will Training.” His prac
tice involved mental patients to
begin with, but he expanded his
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practice to help persons not as
seriously ill.
Recovery doesn’t offer diag
nosis, make treatment or deal with
professionals, Fox emphasizes.
Instead, the groups are organized
by voluntary leaders who have
been treated in mental institu
tions. They attend monthly train
ing meetings and are authorized
by the national organization in
Chicago.
Local leader Nancy Campbell,
who organized Eugene’s recovery
group in late November, says the
leaders are a great help to Recov
ery members, because they have
experienced the common fears of
mental patients.
Some of those symptoms may
include include heart palpitations,
dizziness, sweating, numbness,
tremors, fatigue and depression.
In addition, Campbell says there
are many fears that persons
share, such as fears of high
places, crowds, dosed places,
mistakes.
Recovery leaders believe that
underlying all of these manifesta
tions are the basic fears of mental
and physical collapse. If the condi
tion persists for some time, then
another basic fear enters the pic
ture — the fear of never recover
ing.
When Fox was dismissed from
one mental institution, she feared
she would never fully recover from
her mental illness.
The Eugene group meets at the
Harmony House, 1897 Garden
Ave., every Thursday at 8 p.m. In
terested persons are invited to at
tend the meetings at no charge.