The Day of Surgery

• Wear comfortable clothing.
• Take your medications as indicated by a member of our team in the pre-surgery phone call or by the sheet provided by your surgeon.
• Nothing to eat or drink, including coffee or gum, after midnight on that day.
• You will check in on the first floor of the Texas Health Presbyterian of Kaufman admissions desk through the main entrance.
• You will be escorted up to the second floor of the hospital where you will be assigned a room and allowed to change.
• Our preoperative nurse will interview you, measure your vitals signs, and start an IV.
• A member of our team will meet with you, review your medical history and perform a physical exam on you. They will then explain your personalized anesthetic plan, the risks, and answer any questions.

Personalized Anesthetic Plan

Based on the information you provide, your medical history, previous anesthetics, and planned procedure, we will come up with the safest personalized anesthetic plan that will allow for the quickest recovery to you. The plan may include one or a combination of the following types of anesthesia:

• Sedation- With this type of anesthesia, you will be given medicine to be relaxed while allowing you to wake up quickly after the procedure. This sedation can range from light sedation where you will feel sleepy and may or may not remember the procedure to heavy sedation such as for a colonoscopy where there is a high likelihood you will not remember the procedure yet no invasive airway device needs to be placed.
• Spinal- This type of anesthesia allows us to place a small amount of medicine into your back, safely away from the spinal cord, and numb up from your ribs down. Often the most uncomfortable part of this anesthetic technique is the numbing medicine placed under the skin which feels like an ant bite that quickly goes numb. The spinal medicine usually lasts about 3 hours and is appropriate for most lower body procedures.
• Epidural- Very similar to a spinal anesthetic except it allows us to place a catheter where we can infuse medicine for up to 48 hours of pain relief.
• Regional Block- Using specialized ultrasound equipment, we are able to find the nerves that supply the area where the surgeon will be operating. We then put numbing medicine around these nerves to take away about 50 to 100% of the surgical pain. This can either be done as a "single shot" which will provide 3 to 6 hours of pain relief or as a "continuous catheter" where medicine can be infused for up to three days.
• General Anesthesia- This anesthetic plan provides for complete unconsciousness. Medicine will be infused through your IV where you will drift off to sleep. Once you are asleep, a specialized airway device will be placed to help protect your airway. The airways device will be removed at the safest time possible and there is a high likelihood you may not recall having an airway device in.

Recovery Room to Discharge

• The next thing you may remember after drifting off to sleep is the recovery room. You will have one on one care from a specialized recovery room nurse who will watch your vitals signs, physically examine you, and ensure your safety after surgery.
• You will be watched for at least 15 minutes and a member from our anesthesia team will be immediately available in case there are concerns.
• Once you have met discharge criteria, you will either be taken up to the preoperative room or to the floor for admission.
• If you are taken to your preoperative room, a nurse will monitor your vital signs, monitor you for any safety concerns and ensure that you are appropriate to be discharged home.
• If you are taken to the floor, a nurse will assess you and explain the rest of the process.
• A member from our anesthesia team is always available, either in the facility or on call.
• Once you have met discharge criteria, you will be sent home with discharge instructions from the surgeon and other team members.

The Pain Scale

One of our providers will call to check on you daily while the block is in.

One of the things we are looking for is your "Pain Score."

This scale is from 0 to 10.

"0"- No pain at all

"1 to 3"- The "normal" amount of pain felt with a nerve block. Pain medicine easily takes the edge off.

"4 to 6"- The pain is "uncomfortable" requiring pain medicine on a regular basis.

"7 to 9"- The pain medicine does not feel like it is helping.

"10"- It feels like someone is cutting you open, intense sharp pain.

Removing Your Catheter

1. Wash your hands.
2. Close the white clamp and set the dial to zero.
3. Gently remove the dressing until the insertion site is clearly visible.
4. In a slow steady motion, remove the catheter. If any resistance is felt, stop and call us.
5. Clear liquid might leak from insertion site. Placed a band-aid over it.
6. The pain medicine will continue to work for 3 to 6 hours after removing the block, make sure you take some pain medicine about 3 hours after pulling it out.

Call Us

If you feel this is an emergency, call 911.

This phone number is only for anesthesia concerns related to continuous nerve blocks. For any other concerns, please call your surgeon's office and they will direct the call appropriately.

Phone: 1 (972) 932-7200

Ask to speak with anesthesia provider on call.

Please note: We do not refill pain medicine, give anesthesia quotes, or answer billing questions when calling this number.

Billing Questions

Please note: acute and continuous nerve blocks are performed and billed through Kaufman Orthopedic Pain Management. For questions, please call 1 (817) 294-7444.

For other billing questions, please contact:

Abeo Billing Inquiries

1 (855) 871-9866

Request a Proposal

If you are a hospital, a group, or would like to contact Genesis Anesthesia for any other business matter, please fill out the following form and we will get back to you as soon as possible.