I’ve heard that if someone undergoes surgery and needs to be put under with general anesthesia, that the doctor will put a tube down your lungs to make sure you get enough oxygen.
So does this mean a person under general anesthesia is incapable of breathing on their own, or is it done as a safety measure?
Final question:
How do doctors know when to take the tube out before a patient wakes up? I’ve never been put under before, but one of my fear has always been to wake up with a metal tube down my throat and get that Matrix Neo experience when he first wakes up in the pod and pulls a giant tube from his throat.
Does this ever happen? How is it prevented?
In: 197
So the tube isn’t metal. It’s a flexible plastic, like clear vinyl tubing you can buy at the hardware store, but nicer than that. It just has to reach past your voicebox, so it goes into your trachea, not all the way to your lungs. It has a little balloon-like area near its tip that you can inflate with about two teaspoons-worth of air, which expands to form a seal around your trachea. That way, if any secretions/saliva find their way down there, they won’t make it to your lungs.
You’re in the process of waking up when they remove the tube. The process is that they give you a big breath with the bag they use to send air down the tube (the Ambu bag), deflate the little balloon, and slide it out. They encourage you to cough when they do it, to bring up any saliva or secretions that might be around the tube. Usually, you’ll cough anyway. People don’t remember the tube, as they’re groggy when it is removed.
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