Medicating Anaesthesiology: Pharmaceutical Change, Specialisation and Healthcare Reform in Post-War Britain

Abstract

Summary This article examines how chemists, pharmacologists and anaesthetists developed the anaesthetic drug halothane and assessed the clinical use of the drug in the UK in the 1950s. I argue that halothane became seen as a superior drug not because of properties inherent in the new molecule CF3-CHClBr, but because anaesthetists used it to build a professional identity during a period of significant change in British medicine. The recently established National Health Service called for increasing the number of anaesthetists and other specialist hospital consultants. In this context, the specialist knowledge, novel technologies and new practices necessary for the safe usage of halothane enabled anaesthetists to forge a profession. The history of this process shows how professionalisation, pharmaceutical change and healthcare reform have interacted to shape knowledge transfer between laboratory and hospital with consequences for experimental ethics and patient safety.