What types of anesthesia are there?

Three--: Local anesthesia where only the part being operated upon is anesthetized, general anesthesia where the patient is totally asleep (must be administered by an anesthesiologist or crna) or "twilight sleep" (conscious sedation) where the patient is relaxed and sedated but can respond to pain or commands from the surgeon (this is virtually always combined with local anesthesia to prevent pain.).

Many kinds: General (completely out). Regional (the nerves to part of your body are blocked). Local (the surgical area is directly numbed). Monitored anesthesia care(sedation and monitoring).

Excellent question: General anesthesia is being put out completely. Regional anesthesia involves anesthesia only to the area involved such as a leg or an arm. Therevare many wsys to administer this. Local anesthesia is numbing of the nerves in a specific location. Sometimes different combinations are used to get the best results.

Several: Although there are different categories of anesthesia (general/regional/sedation), one must keep in mind that some anesthetics can easily slip into another such as deep sedation can become a general anesthetic. So it is very important to be monitored by someone well-trained and comfortable in providing these different types of anesthetics.

Choice: Anesthesiologist has many options when choosing the type of anesthesia for the patients. General, regional, sedation or local are the major options. Choice depends on the patient's preference, co-existing medical problems, surgeon's preferences, setting, safety concerns and anesthesiologists judgement what is the best for the patient. Safety and patient's comfort are major considerations.

See below: Local anesthesia: injecting medication into a small area to numb it. Regional anesthesia: injecting medicine around a major nerve root or spine to numb an entire area of the body. General anesthesia: putting the whole body to sleep.

Types of anesthesia : General anesthesia, spinal anesthesia, epidural anesthesia, monitored anesthesia care or mac, various nerve blocks; isolating a specific area of the body, epidural injections for chronic pain management and a combination of some of the above, such as combined spinal-epidural, usually for OB but not exclusively, epidural-general for major abdominal or thoracic surgery.