Clinical recovery and psychomotor function after brief anesthesia with propofol or thiopental

Propofol, the new intravenous anesthetic agent, is generally used in outpatient anesthesia with expectations of fast recovery. We assessed recovery from anesthesia in a double-blind, crossover, controlled manner in 12 healthy volunteers using clinical tests during the first hour and several psychomotor tests 0.5, 1, 3, 5, and 7 h after brief anesthesia with propofol (2.5 mg/kg and 1.0 mg/kg 3 min later) or thiopental (5.0 mg/kg and 2.0 mg/kg 3 min later). Subjects were able to respond to command, sit, and stand steadily significantly faster (P less than 0.05) after propofol (time until standing steadily 33 +/- 7 min; mean +/- SD) when compared to thiopental anesthesia (time until standing steadily 62 +/- 29 min; mean +/- SD). Psychomotor performance remained significantly worse (P less than 0.05 to P less than 0.001) compared to control for 1 h after propofol and for 5 h after thiopental anesthesia. We conclude that the rapid and complete recovery makes propofol a suitable anesthetic for patients undergoing brief ambulatory surgery.