Study Shows Use of Less Polluting Anesthetic Agents Is Safe and Reduces Carbon Emissions

A study performed at Michigan Medicine has shown that “the use of less polluting inhaled anesthetic agents reduced harmful emissions by 50% in one year without impacting patient safety or outcomes.”

About 3% of healthcare carbon emissions stem from “inhaled agents used during anesthesia.” These new findings culminate from “The Green Anesthesia Initiative, launched at Michigan Medicine in March 2022 aimed to reduce the use of nitrous oxide, use less environmentally harmful inhaled fluorinated ethers, and increase the use of intravenous anesthetics.”

The research team compared the use of CO2 equivalents, “traditionally used to measure the effect of greenhouse gases on the environment, as well as the amount of anesthetic used and patient outcomes such as post-surgery nausea and vomiting, pain scores, and unintended awareness and recall of the surgery.” The department encouraged providers to “reduce the use of nitrous oxide…as well as increase the use of sevoflurane, the least environmentally harmful ether, instead of isoflurane.”

These changes “were associated with an average decrease of more than 14 kg per case in CO2 equivalents. There were no changes in measured depth of anesthesia, pain scores, or postoperative nausea and vomiting.” Members of the research team are hopeful that these results “show that we can redesign our long standing approaches to care without compromising patient safety, quality, and outcomes.”