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Malignant Hyperthermia, Taylor M. Morriss

Nursing Student Class Projects (Formerly MSN)

Complications related to the anesthetic process are multifaceted and abundant. As a future nurse anesthesia student, the underlying pathophysiology, diagnosis, and treatment of anesthesia-related complications are of particular interest. One such anesthesia-induced life-threatening metabolic process involves the hypermetabolism of skeletal muscle. This pharmacogenetic process, known as malignant hyperthermia (MH), has a variable incidence rate ranging from 1:10,000 to 1: 250,000 anesthetic cases. However, the prevalence of the genetic abnormalities may be as great as one in 400 individuals (Rosenberg, Pollock, Schiemann, Bulger, & Stowell, 2015, p. 1). “Malignant hyperthermia (MH) is a rare, but life-threatening, autosomal-dominant inherited disorder that may …