Oblivion Orchestra Hall: How to Facilitate Emergence from Anesthesia with Music

One of the most challenging issues in anesthesia is reducing the time the patient stays in the recovery room. The time to emerge from anesthesia is affected by several factors, such as patients’ general conditions, anesthetic factors, duration of surgery, and other stimuli (1). Among these, the type of anesthetic used and the extent of the procedure performed are the main factors in determining the duration of anesthesia. However, reducing this period beyond all of the above can provide the conditions for reducing the risks of anesthesia and the costs involved.Anesthesia, in many ways, is similar to sleeping (2). Electroencephalographic features and brain regions are activated in both states of unconsciousness (3). Thus, sleep-related pathways can play an effective role in resolving the problems caused by prolonged anesthesia.Using sounds is a common way around the world to wake people up. Understanding how thebrain translates a structured sequence of sounds into a pleasant experience is a question that may be crucial to understand the processing of abstract rewards better. Previous findings point to the dopaminergic system in music-evoked pleasure.