When They Say You're Sedated While On A Ventilator, What Exactly Does That Mean? Are You Completely Unconscious

When they say you're sedated while on a ventilator, what exactly does that mean? Are you completely unconscious the entire time?

Not necessarily, but being on a vent is really stressful and painful. There’s a tube down the person’s throat so it feels like they’re choking, and they’re not controlling their own breathing (certain vent settings provide more control than others), which is genuinely terrifying for most people. If someone is “fighting” the vent because it feels like they’re suffocating, they’re not being helped by it as much as they could be, and that’s a lot of energy wasted. Plus, the vent could be necessary for days or even weeks, and that’s just hella traumatic. To make the experience more comfortable and stop the person fighting the vent, often a combination of sedating, pain relieving, and paralytic medication is given.

As I’ve talked about before, sedation doesn’t necessarily make someone completely unconscious. A lot of times, it just puts them in a state where they can better tolerate what is being done to them. So it can be full-on  unconscious and paralyzed, or where they’re awake but their memory isn’t quite intact, or they’re awake but don’t really care all that much about the vent, or if they’re fairly used to it, mostly awake with some pain and/or anti-anxiety medication. It all kind of depends on what the person is able to tolerate while still getting what they need from the vent.