The DOI matches its Crossref record.
Volatile anaesthetics and the atmosphere: atmospheric lifetimes and atmospheric effects of halothane, enflurane, isoflurane, desflurane and sevoflurane
Open accessAbstract
The atmospheric lifetimes of the halogenated anaesthetics halothane, enflurane, isoflurane, desflurane and sevoflurane with respect to reaction with the hydroxyl radical (OH.) and UV photolysis have been determined from observations of OH. reaction kinetics and UV absorption spectra. Rate coefficients for the reaction with OH radicals for all halogenated anaesthetics investigated ranged from 0.44 to 2.7 x 10(-14) cm3 molec-1 s-1. Halothane, enflurane and isoflurane showed distinct UV absorption in the range 200-350 nm. In contrast, no absorption in this wavelength range was detected for desflurane or sevoflurane. The total atmospheric lifetimes, as derived from both OH. reactivity and photolysis, were 4.0-21.4 yr. It has been calculated that up to 20% of anaesthetics enter the stratosphere. As a result of chlorine and bromine content, the ozone depletion potential (ODP) relative to chlorofluorocarbon CFC-11 varies between 0 and 1.56, leading to a contribution to the total ozone depletion in the stratosphere of approximately 1% for halothane and 0.02% for enflurane and isoflurane. Estimates of the greenhouse warming potential (GWP) relative to CFC-12 yield values of 0.02-0.14, resulting in a relative contribution to global warming of all volatile anaesthetics of approximately 0.03%. The stratospheric impact of halothane, isoflurane and enflurane and their influence on ozone depletion is of increasing importance because of decreasing chlorofluorocarbons globally. However, the influence of volatile anaesthetics on greenhouse warming is small.
Overview
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“In contrast, desflurane and sevoflurane have no ozone-depleting effect because of their complete fluorination.36”
From A call for immediate climate action in anesthesiology: routine use of minimal or metabolic fresh gas flow reduces our ecological footprint (2023) · cites this paper as [36]
Citations
Cites
Still being checked.
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Kümmerer, K. (2001) · Chemosphere · doi:10.1016/s0045-6535(01)00144-8 · Cited by 1,166
Environmental sustainability in anaesthesia and critical care
McGain, F., Muret, J. C., Lawson, C., & Sherman, J. D. (2020) · British Journal of Anaesthesia · doi:10.1016/j.bja.2020.06.055 · Cited by 485
Global Warming Potential of Inhaled Anesthetics: Application to Clinical Use
Ryan, S. M., & Nielsen, C. J. (2010) · Anesthesia & Analgesia · doi:10.1213/ane.0b013e3181e058d7 · Cited by 340
Assessing the Impact on Global Climate from General Anesthetic Gases
Andersen, M. P. S., Nielsen, O. J., Wallington, T. J., Karpichev, B., & Sander, S. P. (2012) · Anesthesia & Analgesia · doi:10.1213/ane.0b013e31824d6150 · Cited by 230
People, planet and profits: the case for greening operating rooms
Kagoma, Y., Stall, N., Rubinstein, E., & Naudie, D. (2012) · Canadian Medical Association Journal · doi:10.1503/cmaj.112139 · Cited by 229
Metadata
- Authors
- Langbein, T., Sonntag, H., Trapp, D., Hoffmann, A., Malms, W., Röth, E. P., Mörs, V, & Zellner, R.
- Affiliations
- University of Göttingen (DE)
- ORCID
- Langbein, T
- Venue
- British Journal of Anaesthesia
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 1999-01
- Volume
- 82
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 66-73
- ISSN
- 0007-0912 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2127792082
- Cited by
- 153
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 14 · 2024: 18 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 2 · 2021: 12 · 2020: 13 · 2019: 10 · 2018: 4 · 2017: 4 · 2016: 1 · 2015: 5 · 2014: 9 · 2013: 6 · 2012: 9
- FWCI
- 1.50
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- British Journal of Anaesthesia (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- GRO (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Atmospheric Science › Atmospheric Ozone and Climate
- Physical Sciences › Earth and Planetary Sciences › Atmospheric Science › Atmospheric chemistry and aerosols
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Atmospheric and Environmental Gas Dynamics
- Keywords
- volatile anesthetics, atmospheric lifetime, halothane, enflurane, isoflurane, desflurane, sevoflurane, UV photolysis, stratospheric transport, ozone depletion potential, chlorofluorocarbons, halogenated compounds
- MeSH terms
- Air Pollutants, Atmosphere, Humans, Models, Chemical, Ozone, Spectrophotometry, Ultraviolet, Hydroxyl Radical, Greenhouse Effect, Anesthetics, Inhalation
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
