Future in regional anesthesia: new techniques and technological advancements

Abstract

Regional anesthesia has a very interesting long history, initially preferred over general anesthesia because of safety concerns, then for a period general anesthesia became safer and was preferred. The use of innovative technologies such as ultrasound technology has made the blocks safer and successful by directly visualizing targeted nerves and the location of local anesthetics. With the wide use of ultrasound in the regional anesthesia field success rate of peripheral nerve blocks increased and novel blocks techniques developed. Moreover, new extended-release local anesthetic agents have begun to be promising time-efficient and longer duration of analgesia with a single injection. In this article, we attempt to summarize some of the novel block techniques, pharmacological agents, and new technologies in the field of regional anesthesia.