To evaluate the influence of the mode of anesthesia on the neonatal outcome after the caesarian delivery.

All the patients who were going to have a caesarian section were enrolled to the trial & their demographic data along with the Apgar Score and need for the NICU (Neonatal intensive care unit) admission, was entered in a specially designed proforma. After the data collection (from 1st March 2010 to 28th February 2011) the data was entered in SPSS version 19 & was analyzed statistically.

There were 1308 caesarian deliveries out of which 59.6% (n=779) were delivered electively while 40.4% (n=529) had an emergency delivery. The rate of general anesthesia versus spinal anesthesia was the same i.e. 59.2% (n=199) & 59.7% (n=580) respectively in elective delivery group & 40.8% (n=137) & 40.3% (n=392) respectively in emergency delivery group & this difference was found statistically insignificant. The Apgar Score of the neonates delivered to patients having general anesthesia was significantly poor as compared to the spinal anesthesia group & the rate of NICU admission is also high in general anesthesia group i.e. 10% (n=34) as compared to 5.8% (n=56); this difference was also statistically significant (p=0.018).

Spinal anesthesia is associated with better neonatal outcome as compared to general anesthesia in both emergency and elective C/Section group.