Regional anaesthesia in children: pros and cons

Regional Anaesthesia, as an adjunct to General anaesthesia (GA) for intraoperative and sometimespostoperative analgesia, is a common and accepted standard of care in paediatric and neonatal surgery. Most frequently these include caudal, ilioinguinal/ iliohypogastric or spinal blocks for Genito-urinary, lower abdominal or lower limb surgery and penile blocks for hypospadius repair andcircumcisions.General anaesthesia can safely be offered to almost all infants and children, however narcotics for pain relief may produce significant respiratory depression.