Attitude of general public to risks associated with anaesthesia

To identify specific fears being entertained about general anaesthesia.

People who do work in any medical facility were targeted in this prospective questionnaire-based study. All respondents were literate. The questionnaire was divided into two sections; (a) The baseline information, which included age, sex, marital status, occupation, previous exposure to anaesthesia and patient preference for anaesthesia technique. (b) Fear about risks associated with general anaesthesia; respondents were expected to pick one of four options (very concerned, somewhat concerned, not concerned and not sure), to indicate how they feel about each of the eight risks listed in the questionnaire. The data obtained was analyzed using SSPS version 10 for Windows.

In a bivariate analysis, marital status, occupation and previous exposure to anaesthesia are not associated with the expressed fear by the respondents. Respondents had the highest concern for the fear of death (82%), followed by fear of postoperative pain (75.4%). Least concern was for awareness during anaesthesia (37.7%). The mean age of those who expressed concern about being aware during operation is 37.0 +/- 8.6 years while those not concerned is 31.8 +/- 8.5 years (p=0.034). More of those who are concerned with nakedness preferred general anaesthesia (p = 0.023). Also, more females (95.7%) than males (70.6%) expressed fear about pain during general anaesthesia (p = 0.019).

Fear of death is a great concern for our patients coming for general anaesthesia and it is followed closely by fear of postoperative pain, the later was of greater concern to females. Finally, more of those who were concerned about nakedness preferred general anaesthesia.