The Influence of Body Mass Index on Sensorimotor Block and Vasopressor Requirement during Spinal Anesthesia for Elective Cesarean Delivery

Abstract

Physiological changes associated with pregnancy are significant enough to have serious anesthetic implications. When these are compounded by obesity, the anesthesiologists may have to deal with a patient with seriously limited physiological reserve. Obese patients often had co-morbidities and pathological changes in different organ systems. Obesity has been identified as a significant risk factor for anesthesia due to technical difficulties of airway (e.g. increased incidence of difficult intubation, difficult mask ventilation and rapid desaturation during induction of general anesthesia) & this will be associated with a significantly increased maternal and fetal risk. Regional anesthesia using local anesthetics with or without opioids is a preferred anesthetic technique for elective and emergency cesarean delivery (CD) in both non-obese and morbidly obese patients. Hypotension after induction of spinal anesthesia (SA) is a common event leading to maternal dizziness, nausea and vomiting, impaired placental perfusion, and fetal academia. The spread of spinal anesthetic drugs has been reported to be variable. The sensory block level in patients