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Recent research suggests healthy people may be able to safely drink fluids up to one-and-a-half hours before an anaesthetic, rather than fasting overnight or for five or six to hours as is usually recommended. But do not try this at home! If you've ever needed an anaesthetic, you'll have been told either to fast overnight or for five or six hours. The reason is the risk of aspiration - that's a scary situation where stuff in your stomach regurgitates back into the lungs, causing a pneumonia which can be lethal. It's especially a problem in pregnant women, and in emergencies - where fasting, as you might imagine, might be impossible. But fasting can make you feel hungry, rotten and dehydrated and even increase anxiety and post-operative pain. This has made some anaesthetists wonder whether it's safe to drink fluids perhaps up to two or three hours before the surgery. A review of the available scientific evidence in healthy people, has found that clear fluids drunk between one-and-a-half and three hours pre-operatively made no difference to the amount of stuff in the stomach or its acidity at the time the anaesthetic was given. In fact there's a little evidence, the residual volume was actually less. There were no incidents of aspiration. The provisos here are that you don't do anything unless your surgeon's anaesthetist agrees, and that you aren't someone who's at higher than average risk of aspiration in the first place.
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