Sleep science in anesthesiology

Abstract

The discipline of sleep science offers two merits to anesthesiology: a basic aspect and a clinical aspect. The basic aspect’s merit is that sleep science provides knowledge that can be useful to elucidate the mechanism by which general anesthesia works, especially concerning the loss of consciousness. On the other hand, the clinical aspect’s merit is that knowledge of sleep science may provide answers to solving postoperative sleep disturbance, which is widely recognized as one of the established factors that exacerbates problems associated with the postoperative course. Anesthesia-induced amnesia is a distinct state from physiological sleep, especially considering that general anesthesia has the potential to be harmful. If we develop a method of anesthesia that results in a state of amnesia similar to physiological sleep, it may be beneficial to patients.