General anesthesia, ascorbic acid, and consciousness

Previous research has indicated that ascorbic acid may be related to consciousness following the administration of general anesthesia. This is important in that one of the primary goals of anesthesia administration is to return the patient to full consciousness as quickly following surgery as possible. This research project involved two separate studies. The first study (N = 58) was conducted to evaluate the effects of general anesthesia administration on plasma ascorbic acid levels during three time points (before anesthesia, one hour post-induction, and 30-minutes post anesthesia cessation). The second study (N = 50) was conducted to evaluate the effects of general anesthesia on plasma ascorbic acid (before anesthesia, 15 minutes after induction of anesthesia, 15 minutes after surgical incision, and 15 minutes post anesthesia cessation) and to evaluate if there was a relationship between this effect and post anesthesia consciousness. These studies were designed as a pretest-posttest repeated measures investigation so that change in plasma ascorbic acid levels could be assessed in association with the anesthesia regimen. Both studies took place at a large metropolitan, government medical center in the mid-south. The mean plasma ascorbic acid levels obtained in both studies were higher prior to anesthesia administration and did not return to baseline pre-anesthetic levels after cessation of anesthesia. During the second study, the Wechsler Memory Scale 3rd edition was used to measure level of consciousness at baseline and post-anesthesia. There was no relationship between Wechsler scores and ascorbic acid level at any of the four time points. The findings do not support the existence of a relationship between ascorbic acid levels and post-anesthesia consciousness. The results from both studies suggest that in non-emergent surgical patients undergoing general anesthesia, changes occur in plasma ascorbic acid during different time points during the anesthesia regimen. However, there were no statistically significant relationships between ascorbic acid use and improved post anesthesia consciousness scores. Of concern was that a total of 27% of the participants in the two studies had below normally accepted levels of plasma ascorbic acid.