Summary: Researchers report children who underwent general anesthesia and surgery prior to the age of one showed decreased white matter volume and integrity.

Source: University of Iowa.

Researchers say white matter integrity, volume may be decreased.

General anesthesia and surgery in otherwise healthy infants under the age of 1 year old could be associated with decreases in the amount of white matter in the brain, as well as reductions in the remaining white matter’s integrity, according to a new University of Iowa Health Care study published this week in the Online First edition of Anesthesiology, the peer-reviewed medical journal of the American Society of Anesthesiologists.

Researchers conducted structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) tests on 34 children between the ages of 12 and 15 years old – 17 otherwise healthy patients who had been administered general anesthesia and had…