Regional anesthesia is a type of anesthesia. It blocks pain to a
part of the body without causing the patient to sleep. Regional
anesthesia is used to make the body numb for surgery: Anesthesia
Injection into Spinal Canal—Epidural Copyright © Nucleus Medical
Media, Inc. Complications are rare, but no procedure is
completely free of risk. If you are planning to have anesthesia,
your doctor will review a list of possible complications, which
may include: Some factors that may increase the risk of
complications include: Your doctor will likely do the following:
Leading up to your procedure: With regional anesthesia, you may
remain awake, but you will usually be given a sedative to help
calm you. Prior to administering the anesthesia: Your
anesthesiologist will inject medicine near a cluster of nerves.
The selected nerves will be the ones that supply the area of
your body that requires surgery. Types of regional anesthesia
include epidural and spinal. Both involve injecting medicines in
or near the spinal canal.