"Who Should Provide Anesthesia Care?" (editorial, Sept. 7) proposes allowing nurses to deliver anesthesia without the supervision of any doctor.
Researchers at the Lewin Group judged nurse anesthetists acting without supervision as the most cost-effective way to deliver anesthesia care.
Seventy-eight Americans die daily from an opioid overdose, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and as someone who delivers anesthesia regularly to surgery patients, the problem strikes close to home for Sun.
In 2010, anesthesiologist and medical societies filed a lawsuit in state court asserting that allowing nurse anesthetists to deliver anesthesia without supervision was not consistent with state law, a requirement for opting out of the federal rule.
"With the removal of the requirement, it actually increases access to health care for citizens in rural Colorado," said Scott K. Shaffer, president of the nurse anesthetists association in Colorado, one of 17 states that have chosen to allow nurses to deliver anesthesia without supervision.
After installing an anesthesia machine and hosting a training for its staff, the hospital will now serve as a regional training center for anesthesia providers and biomedical technicians across the country, ensuring that providers are able to deliver anesthesia appropriately and technicians are able to maintain medical equipment effectively and efficiently.
Similarly, volunteer anesthesiologists from developed nations seeking to help under resourced hospitals find themselves lacking in the skills necessary to deliver anesthesia in a new environment.
Most now deliver with anesthesia, done with a range of drugs that do not affect the baby, administered by a needle inserted just outside the spinal cord to block pain from the navel down.
Shockingly, only 16%% of government hospitals and 50%% of mission hospitals were able to deliver safe anesthesia for adults [ 1].
