By Ela Matters Staff 
The anesthesiologist is the person who makes sure you don’t feel pain, don’t wake up in the middle of surgery, and come out safe on the other side. Most times, it goes off without a hitch. But sometimes, patients wake up in the middle of surgery. Others suffer oxygen loss, brain damage, or even die.
Most of the time, these mistakes could have been avoided if the anesthesiologist or the hospital had followed the right steps. When these kinds of errors occur, victims need to contact an anesthesia injury lawyer as soon as possible. Because unless you know exactly what you’re looking for, it can be hard to tell if what happened to you was just a bad outcome, or something that should never have happened in the first place.
Common Anesthesia Errors
Now, let’s go over the common anesthesia mistakes that are grounds for filing a medical claim:
Failing to Follow Due Protocol Before Administering
Before anesthesia is administered, there’s a strict protocol that anesthesiologists are supposed to follow. This includes reviewing your full medical history, checking for any allergies, discussing potential complications, and going over your current medications.
Basically, they need to make sure that your body won’t react negatively to the anesthesia. Skipping this step or rushing through it can lead to life-threatening problems.
If the anesthesiologist fails to identify an allergy, for instance, you could have a severe reaction during surgery. If they don’t check how your heart or lungs are functioning, you might be at risk for respiratory failure.
And if they simply don’t take the time to communicate properly with the surgical team, everyone’s on the wrong page, and this makes accidents more likely to happen. This kind of oversight is unacceptable, and it’s one of the more common causes of anesthesia-related malpractice claims.
Failing to Get Consent
Another serious issue is when anesthesia is given without proper informed consent. They need to make sure that you understand what’s going to happen, why it’s being done, what the risks are, and what your options might be.
If you weren’t clearly told what could go wrong, or if you didn’t even know you were getting anesthesia in the first place, that’s a violation of your rights as a patient.
Performing any medical procedure, especially one involving anesthesia, without your full and informed agreement is not only unethical, it’s also legally wrong.
Administering the Wrong Dosage
Getting the dosage wrong is one of the most well-known anesthesia errors. If you’re given too much anesthesia, your heart rate can spike, your blood pressure can go dangerously high, and your breathing can become erratic or stop altogether.
On the other hand, if you get too little, you might wake up in the middle of surgery, which is a horrifying and traumatic experience known as anesthesia awareness.
There’s no margin for error here. Administering the wrong amount can lead to serious injury or even death. These are situations where it’s often very clear that something went wrong and that someone needs to be held accountable.
High Spinal Errors
In cases involving spinal or epidural anesthesia, things can go south quickly if the medication spreads too high up the spine. When the anesthetic reaches nerves above the T4 vertebra, it can start affecting the muscles that help you breathe. This means your diaphragm and intercostal muscles may stop working, leaving you unable to breathe on your own.
This type of mistake can also cause your heart to stop or lead to complete loss of consciousness when that wasn’t intended. High spinal errors are extremely serious, and they are typically the result of carelessness or poor judgment during the injection process.
Improper Intubation
Most patients under general anesthesia need help breathing, so they are set up for intubation. Intubation is when a breathing tube is inserted into your airway to make sure your lungs get enough oxygen. It’s a delicate procedure and must be done with precision.
When doctors rush or perform the procedure carelessly, the tube can damage your throat or even your trachea. If it’s not placed correctly, you could be left without enough oxygen, leading to brain damage.
A sore throat is the best-case scenario in these situations; hypoxia or permanent respiratory issues are far more serious consequences.
Not Monitoring and Following Up on the Patient
The anesthesiologist should be monitoring your vital signs throughout the procedure and even afterward to catch any signs of trouble.
When they don’t, a patient could go into cardiac arrest, experience organ failure, or suffer other complications that might have been prevented with proper monitoring.
Failing to catch and address those warning signs in time is another major cause of anesthesia malpractice cases.