Are spinal anesthetics safe?
I need a total hip replacement and the surgeon I’ve seen says he uses spinals for surgery. I’ve heard bad things about this and wonder how safe that kind of anesthesia is. A 11: Thanks for your question. You can rest assured that spinal anesthesia is a safe choice for hip surgery. Many patients when offered this type of anesthesia are concerned about serious side effects, such as paralysis, and also about troubling but less dangerous side effects, such as headache. There seems to be a common, although false, perception that these complications occur often. In fact, spinal anesthesia has a long track record of safety, with a rate of serious complications (low!) about equal to the rate of major problems with general anesthesia (also low!). Studies that have looked at the overall outcome of spinal and general anesthesia for hip surgery have not found a completely convincing advantage of one over the other, and therefore both types of anesthesia are commonly used. In our hospital, at least
