Dreaming in Reality “He will sleep the sleep of death,” said Ghoneim (2001) in his book Awareness During Anesthesia (p. 55). Patient recall is a scary and fascinating concept that describes how a patient can remember events while under anesthesia during surgery. It is a growing concern in the medical field due to its traumatic effects on patients. Patient awareness involves the patient under anesthesia experiencing pain, vaguely remembering music, or remembering doctors talking as if the patient were dreaming. This topic is very controversial as there are not many cases where a patient has experienced a memory or brought it to the anesthesiologist's attention. In this essay, my goal is to discuss anesthesia, patient recall, and ways we can solve this problem. Patient recall involves patients with preconceived notions as well as poorly trained professionals who make mistakes. To solve this problem both patients and anesthesiologists must work together.` Anesthesia has been used throughout the history of medicine; the purpose of anesthesia is to prevent pain during surgery or any other medical procedure. Claudia M. Caruana (2010) states that anesthesia works by blocking nerve signals going to the brain to allow the body to respond and try to stop the pain (p. 8). Anesthesia has many different uses for many different types of surgeries, from the use of very strong sedatives for intensive surgeries to the use of very light sedatives such as nitrous oxide for pain relief. All drugs in the anesthetist's arsenal have different uses for different occasions, which can be an advantage and can also be a flaw. Anesthesia is a necessary evil that must be used during surgeries and... middle of paper... ....unaware and unaware of what is happening, but in some unusual circumstances the person can remember events with certain stimuli such as hypnosis. Explicit memory is also what is most recognized because the patient is completely or conscious enough to remember exactly what happened after the surgery was completed (p. 3). There are cases of patients experiencing awareness that are horrible examples of how the patient remembers is a serious problem that we need to correct. In CNN Health, Landau (2010) interviews a woman named Carol Weiher who woke up to listen to music and talk while undergoing eye surgery (para. 1). Landau also mentions that Weiher feels “Cut deeper, pull harder” (par. 1). According to the Mayo Clinic in the article Awake during surgery: 'I'm in hell “about one or two people in 1000 may wake up during general anesthesia” (par.. 4).