April 16, 2012 

Anesthesia risk part II.

Here is a second piece of data that reinforces the need to be careful with anesthesia in young children.  See Newsletter volume 1;#23 for details.

In the journal Pediatrics 2011, Flick et al. have noted a link between anesthesia use in children less than 2 years old and learning disabilities. They found that children who had been exposed to general anesthesia and surgery two or more times before the age of 2 years old were more likely to develop learning disabilities than a control group.  

There is an almost 2 fold increase in learning disabilities when exposed to surgery and anesthesia twice before 24 months of age.

Here is a common hypothetical scenario.  Your child is intolerant to dairy and has recurrent ear infections and rhinitis.  At age 10 months, he undergoes ear tube placement.  By 18 months, he needs his tonsils removed because of uncontrolled sleep apnea.  If we could have tried an elimination diet without dairy, we perhaps could have prevented unnecessary surgery and now a risk of learning issues.  

I realize that some surgery is unavoidable, i.e. heart surgery, but where possible, paying attention to other options is a great choice for care.  

If your child has to have surgery at this critical developmental stage, I recommend talking to an anesthesiologist about limiting the number of anesthetics used to 1 or 2 at most.  (preferably one!!!)