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Outpatient Surgery Magazine
Date Published:
February 2004 No Opioids, No Oxygen, No Fires
Re: “Preventing Surgical Fires” (December 2003). Your otherwise excellent story failed to mention the advantages of using BIS-monitored propofol ketamine (PK) anesthesia as a pre-emptive solution. Essential to PK technique, which provides the illusion of general anesthesia to the patient, is the avoidance of opioids, which eliminates the requirement of oxygen, an ignition source for fires.
Barry L. Friedberg, M.D.
Corona del Mar, CA
Volunteer Instructor in Clinical Anesthesia
University of Southern California
Los Angeles, CA