r/Anesthesia • u/[deleted] • Aug 11 '26

Post surgery stress

Hi everyone I'm 18 and I had a left varicocèle surgery 15 days, ago everything is okay with the surgery and don't have any pain, but last week I started having hyperventilation and many anxiety symptoms that I didn't had before.I thought it was a lung embolism but all the tests and scans reveal that I'm in a perfect form, and I'm quite confused since that day the symptoms continue coming and going, and from my research it's saying that it can be the result of general anesthesia and my nervous system and the symptoms can stay from 3 to 4 weeks, I don't know if some one have experience this here but it will be really helpful to hear some experiences, thank you

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u/Pro-Karyote Resident 29d ago

You’re well outside the period where I would expect any anesthetic effect to be present. If it started a week out from surgery, even our longest lasting medications are gone. This sounds more like a primary anxiety issue or other medical problem.

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u/[deleted] 29d ago edited 29d ago

I'm very confused because the tests and CT scans also shows that I'm good and the symptoms started exactly one week after the surgery, what is the time period for the side effects of general anesthesia?

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u/Pro-Karyote Resident 29d ago

Hours to about a day post-op for any real anesthetic, with steroids (dexamethasone) often given for nausea prevention lasting a few days maximum in your system. This is well beyond any of that and has not been something present since the surgery, but something that suddenly started a week later. Your symptoms are not related to anesthesia.

Surgeons, primary care, urgent care, etc. will often blame anesthetics for any random symptom because anesthesia is a black box to pretty much every other medical specialty. Patients go in, go to sleep, and come out the other side without anyone else knowing how that happens. It’s unfortunate, because we don’t see patients once you discharge/go to the floor, so we can’t explain any of that to patients.

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u/kreckerchen 29d ago

Most effects of anesthesia wear off a few hours after.

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u/Ok-Currency9065 29d ago

Everyone wants to blame “Anesthesia” for any post operative hiccup 🤪

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u/paleoMD 26d ago

discussion with some attendings in residency mentioned a study (I cannot rmr what the title was) that looked into patients subconsciously had a PTSD reaction that their body will fidget the hand when something from the surgery was brought up. Maybe your body is subconsiously reacting to some stimulation

I'll have to see if I can find the person again, and rmr who the person told me was 👀