Ever since its discovery and availability for sale and use in the late 1940s, lidocaine has become an exceptionally commonly used medication . In particular, lidocaine's principal mode of action in acting as a local anesthetic that numbs the sensations of tissues means the agent is indicated for facilitating local anesthesia for a large variety of surgical procedures . It ultimately elicits its numbing activity by blocking sodium channels so that the neurons of local tissues that have the medication applied on are transiently incapable of signaling the brain regarding sensations . In doing so, however, it can block or decrease muscle contractile, resulting in effects like vasodilation, hypotension, and irregular heart rate, among others . As a result, lidocaine is also considered a class Ib anti-arrhythmic agent . Nevertheless, lidocaine's local anesthetic action sees its use in many medical situations or circumstances that may benefit from its action, including the treatment of premature ejaculation .
Regardless, lidocaine is currently available as a relatively non-expensive generic medication that is written for in millions of prescriptions internationally on a yearly basis. It is even included in the World Health Organization's List of Essential Medicines .
Lidocaine is an anesthetic of the amide group indicated for production of local or regional anesthesia by infiltration techniques such as percutaneous injection and intravenous regional anesthesia by peripheral nerve block techniques such as brachial plexus and intercostal and by central neural techniques such as lumbar and caudal epidural blocks .
Assiut university faculty of medicine, Assiut, Egypt
Omar Ali, Assiut, Egypt
Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital, Roanoke, Virginia, United States
B. P. Koirala Institute of Health Sciences, Dharān Bāzār, Nepal
The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, Texas, United States
Hôpital des enfants - Pôle Anesthésie-Réanimation., Toulouse, France
Kingston Public Hospital, Kingston, Jamaica
University Hospital of the West Indies, Kingston, Jamaica
Galeno Desenvolvimento de Pesquisas Clinicas Ltda. - ME, Campinas, SP, Brazil
Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, Hershey, Pennsylvania, United States
Ain Shams University hospitals, Cairo, Egypt
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