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One of the most important verifications before surgery is to make sure the patient didn't eat or drink. We can't just superman-vision into their stomach, so we settle for asking them.
Ya guessed it: one guy lied about not eating breakfast that morning. He aspirated (threw up into his own lungs) shortly after the anesthesia meds kicked in.
The following several minutes were an absolute shit show. He was still alive when they wheeled him out of the OR, but he went straight to ICU, I'm assuming to get him on a vent. Never got an update after that, so no idea if he survived.
If you're gonna get surgery, don't lie to your team.
I imagine with our current medical technology, patients could be given an ultrasound or something to determine what is in their stomach and intestines before surgery, but I see why it would be less expensive and more straightforward to simply trust the patient and ask them. It's their own life on the line after all. But maybe some patients don't fully understand the dangers of having food in their digestive system when going under anesthesia.
100% it's that. I've heard patients say it's just a power trip from the doctor, or because the nurses want your stomach empty so they don't have to clean up if you vomit. Some people have a weird interpretation of what "NOTHING BY MOUTH" means ("No I didn't eat - all I had was a handful of crackers / just one pancake / just coffee / etc")
Pre-op instructions are really bad about conveying why we give that instruction, which is a complaint I've made at every hospital I've worked at. So then the patient gets to the OR, and we're trying to give that lesson verbally, but they've already broken the instruction at that point. Easily the #1 cause of cancellations when that comes to light; but we do get the occasional moron who thinks we're just fucking with them or something or decides its worth risking their life instead of dealing with the hassle of rescheduling... there's some confirmation bias too: this might be the 4th surgery they've had where they ignored that instruction. Ate a full breakfast every time and nothing went wrong, so it becomes like a game to them. Then on #4 the odds catch up to them and suddenly they're digesting their own lungs.
I wish they'd have to watch like a 1m video animation showing what happens. The long list of do's and dont's gets understandably overwhelming.