Scientists from the University of Connecticut (USA) noted that in some people, anesthesia can cause disturbing sexual hallucinations about violence, which can lead to permanent psychological trauma. They found that similar visions occur when operations are performed on certain parts of the body. Study published magazine Journal of Clinical Pharmacology.
There are rare cases where doctors use the unconscious state of people. For example, in 1991, a healthcare worker sexually harassed a university student under anesthesia. Initially, the case was dismissed on the grounds that the patient may have had sexual hallucinations and was not actually violent. But subsequent genetic evidence led the case to the conviction of the perpetrator.
The authors reviewed references to sexual contact hallucinations during anesthesia from the earliest documented case to February 2023. In total, they found 87 cases. In 16 cases, the patient’s relatives were in the operating room when the patient had such hallucinations, which ruled out the possibility of violence by the doctor. In 71 cases, a healthcare worker was alone with a patient at the time of the alleged sexual assault.
“The emotional turmoil experienced by the patient is the same, whether he experienced sexual abuse under anesthesia or had vivid hallucinations. Therefore, it is important to understand exactly what provoked them in order to avoid both false accusations and real violence against surgeons,” he said.
The review also showed that the likelihood of such hallucinations depended on the location of the surgery, for example, oral procedures were perceived by the patient as oral sex, chest caressing, and vaginal sex in the groin. If the operation took place, for example, on the gallbladder, then there were no such hallucinations.