Anaesthesia for awake craniotomy is safe and well-tolerated

Awake craniotomy for tumour resection has been performed at Glostrup Hospital since 2004. We describe and discuss the various anaesthetic approaches for such surgery and retrospectively analyse the 44 planned awake craniotomies performed at Glostrup Hospital. The surgery falls into four phases: craniotomy, mapping, tumour resection and closing. Three methods are being used: monitored anaesthetic care, asleep-awake-asleep and asleep-awake (AA).