What are the risks associated with spinal or epidural anesthetics?
The risks are few and are rare, but they do exist. For a complete list of the risks, please discus them with your anesthesiologist. The most common risks are: lower back tenderness and backache where the spinal or epidural was placed. This is of short duration and the post-delivery medications normally prescribed by your obstetrician should be adequate to accommodate this discomfort. A headache (commonly called a “spinal headache”) can develop from a spinal or epidural, usually within 48 hours. This headache starts when you stand, and stops when you lie down. Spinal headaches sometimes go away without any treatment. If the headache is severe, we can do an epidural blood patch, which takes away about 80 – 90% of these headaches. Talk to your anesthesiologist if you have more questions about this. The epidural space contains small veins and on occasion the epidural medication can be injected into them. This can have multiple effects, but it is usually avoided by a test procedure that the
