With the development of the Internet and the improvement of the national quality, pet owners also have a certain understanding of anesthesia. In clinical practice, veterinarians are frequently asked a lot of professional questions. Technical level should be improved and equipment configuration should be optimized to enhance the competitiveness of the hospital and provide better medical experience for pets and owners.

Leaping development has been achieved in animal inhalation anesthesia: from spontaneous respiratory anesthesia to later respiratory anesthesia, ether and chloroform were skipped and directly developed into isoflurane mask and intubation anesthesia. Due to uncooperative animals, some diagnostic and therapeutic procedures need to be performed under sedation / anesthesia, that’s why the importance and safety of anesthesia should to be highlighted.

Owing to the development and progress of anesthesiology and equipment, human clinical anesthesia mortality rate has been decreased from a very large number to 1 / 300,000 now (veterinary clinical anesthesia mortality rate is much higher), 1/1,000,000 even in some hospitals.

Respiration and circulation are the most critical issues during anesthesia. As the saying goes, “surgery for treatment, anesthesia for life-saving”, the development of anesthesiology has always been centered on the maintenance of life. Anesthesiology has always focused on the maintenance of respiration and circulation.

It’s well-known that most narcotic drugs have an inhibitory effect on respiration and circulation. To achieve a balance between the inhibitory effect, analgesia, comfort and safety is what  anesthetists always pursuit.

Intravenous fluid therapy and the use of vasoactive drugs and positive inotropic drugs are important means for anesthetists to maintain circulatory stability. Should a veterinarian not intervene and only depend on the animal’s own inhalation of oxygen?

Actually not ! ! !

1. Ventilators can effectively counter the inhibitory effect of anesthetics on respiratory. Once respiratory depression occurs, the ventilator provides machine-controlled respiratory, which can liberate the anesthetist’s hands. 

2. Higher requirements for muscle relaxation, for various types of modern surgery. In addition, thoracotomy, laparoscopic surgery, etc., may require the use of muscle relaxants or extremely deep anesthesia. It is difficult to maintain spontaneous breathing and requires a ventilator to control breathing. 

3. The ventilator has a variety of control ventilation modes (pressure control mode, volume control mode, assisted ventilation mode, etc.), which can meet multiple surgical needs.

4. The use of a ventilator effectively avoids the lack of effective lung ventilation or insufficient minute ventilation when anesthetics-induced respiratory suppression occurs while spontaneous breathing continues.

5. Vets have many concerns and a lot of items should be monitored during the operation, while ventilators and their alarms system help reducing work intensity.