Effects of Surgery Under General Anaesthesia on the Electrocardiogram in Ischaemic Heart Disease and Hypertension

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Abstract
Electro-cardiograms were taken before surgery under general anaesthesia and repeated within 24 hours afterwards in 217 patients with ischaemic heart disease or severe hypertension. In 96 patients there was electro-cardiographic deterioration, and this was marked in 48 of them. Three had changes suggestive of infarction; 2 others, in whom the first postoperative ECG showed no fresh ischaemic, developed unequivocal clinical and electrocardiographc evidence of infarction within a week of surgery. There was some correlation between the risk of electro-cardiographic deterioration and the fall in blood -pressure during anaesthesia, the duration of surgery, and abdominal operations. The implications of these findings are discussed.