Before the invention of anaesthetics in medicine, surgery was nothing short of torture for the patient, who had to endure unbearable pain and trauma. It was performed only as a last resort.
The ancient Indian text on medicine, Sushruta Samhita mentions a combination of wine and cannabis as a way to dull the senses before a surgery. The Egyptians and Chinese also used a combination of alcohol and plant extracts for surgical procedures.
In some cases ice or cold water was used to numb the area before surgery and extreme measures like inducing loss of consciousness by blows to the patient’s head were also not uncommon. Hypnotism was another method employed in the late 18th century.
In 1844 a dentist named Horace Wells used nitrous oxide to successfully extract teeth. Ether was first used successfully during a surgery in 1842 by Crawford Williamson Long. Chloroform was used for the first time in 1847 by Sir James Young Simpson. Both these agents became popular around the same time but Chloroform was considered more risky as more fatalities were reported due to its use. The word ‘anaesthesia’ was first used by Oliver Wendell Holmes in 1846 to describe the loss of consciousness during surgery.
The modern era of anaesthetics started in the 1960’s and agents like sevoflurane and isoflurane have replaced Ether and Chloroform. Today general anaesthesia has evolved greatly and is considered to be of low risk.
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