Infant Surgery Without Anesthesia Era

For much of the 20th century, many doctors believed that infants could not truly feel pain. As a result, some newborns routinely underwent major surgeries with little or no anesthesia because physicians assumed their nervous systems were too immature to process pain. Research gradually challenged that belief, showing that infants do experience pain and can suffer serious physiological stress during medical procedures. In 1987, infant pain was formally recognized.

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