RECOVERY AFTER DESFLURANE ANESTHESIA IN THE INFANT - COMPARISON WITH ISOFLURANE

We have studied 20 infants, aged 2.5-8 weeks, undergoing general anaes thesia for pyloromyotomy with either desflurane or isoflurane. Patient s were anaesthetized with equivalent 1 MAC values for age and agent. A blinded observer recorded times to breathing, swallowing, movement, e xtubation and side effects after discontinuation of the agent. Recover y times in the desflurane group were significantly shorter than in the isoflurane group. The times to swallowing, movement and extubation in the desflurane group were 3.89 (so 2.4) min, 5.33 (4.95) min, 7.5 (4. 53) min, respectively, and 8.82 (2.40) min, 10.73 (3.93) min, 13.45 (4 .20) in the isoflurane group. In addition, postoperative apnoea was do cumented in the isoflurane group but not in those infants receiving de sflurane. There was no laryngospasm after extubation in either group. We conclude that desflurane possesses useful characteristics for recov ery conditions in the infant and may be particularly useful in the ex premature infant prone to apnoea and ventilatory depression.