Incidence of Post General Anesthesia Complications in Recovery Room

General anesthesia and surgery cause several physiological disorders in different organs of the respective patients that may appear as several complications during recovery, which need to be identified and evaluated. Survey of the incidence of such complications at Post Anesthesia Care Unit (PACU) 1 and some of the effective risk factors in Rasht Razi Hospital. In this cross-sectional and descriptive study, 155 patients 10-75 years old, in ASA 1 and 2 classes were selected in the hospital. Cases included those who underwent general anesthesia with the same techniques for elective urology surgery and transferred to PACU, in 2010. Questionnaires consisted of two parts, part one included basic information and part two included: respiratory, cardiovascular, neural and digestive complications. Collected data were analyzed using chi-square, paired tests by SPSS 16 and P≤0/05 was considered significant. Findings indicated that the incidence of considerable changes (increase or decrease) in BP, PR and respiration were 42%, 36% and 49%, hypoxemia(SaO2< 90%) 8/4%, pain 76%, shivering 22%, postoperative restlessness 26%, and nausea and vomiting 12% cases, as observed. We found a significant correlation between age and the incidence of considerable changes of PR and postoperative shivering and also between sex and the incidence of pain, shivering, postoperative restlessness and delay in recovery. In addition, the data showed a significant relationship between duration of surgery and shivering, postoperative pain severity and delay in recovery. The relatively high incidence of complications in recovery indicates the importance of employing skilled personnel and also using enough monitoring equipment at PACU in order to decrease mortality and morbidity of the patients and also save on hospital charges.