Thermal Imaging Cameras Confirm Effectiveness of Local Anaesthetics

For many operations the use of local anaesthetics is preferred to general anaesthetics, since it is considered to be safer for the patient. To determine the effectiveness of local anaesthetics the patient is subjected to pin pricks. If the patient indicates a pain sensation then the local anaesthetic is considered to be ineffective. Not only is the pin prick method subjective, it is also useless if the patient is unable to communicate. Furthermore it takes approximately 30 minutes before the pin prick method can be used to reliably determine the success of a local anaesthetic. Researchers at the Erasmus University Medical Centre, Rotterdam, the Netherlands, have found thermal imaging camera to provide a new and objective tool to determine the effectiveness of the local anaesthetics.