[Role of anesthesia in the development of postoperative infectious complications in thoracic oncological surgery]

Clinical analysis of incidence and degree of postoperative infectious complications was made in 140 patients subjected to operations on the lungs for cancer. The analysis has shown that in the group of patients operated upon under conditions of combined halothane anesthesia, the incidence and degree of postoperative infectious complications (suppuration of wounds, pneumonia in the other lung, empyema of the pleura) were considerably higher than in the group of patients operated on under conditions of neuroleptoanesthesia. The incidence of infectious complications was also higher in patients operated upon after preoperative irradiation. Mechanisms of immunosuppressive effects of general halothane anesthesia are discussed.