The peroperative and postoperative blood loss was determined in 36 patients undergoing transurethral prostatectomy (TUR-P) using a photometric method. Seventeen patients were randomly allocated to epidural and 19 patients to general anaesthesia. No significant differences were found between the two groups in the total blood loss peroperatively, the corrected blood loss peroperatively (ml/g/min) or the blood loss postoperatively. The systolic blood pressures were equal in the two groups and no correlation between blood loss and blood pressure was demonstrated. The blood loss per g resected tissue was fairly constant and independent of prostatic weight, but bleeding per minute operating time increased significantly with prostatic size. As the total peroperative blood loss increases with operating time, rapid surgery is a possibility of reducing blood loss in TUR-P. Visual estimation of blood loss during TUR-P of larger glands was unreliable with underestimates of about 100 per cent in one third of the patients, when bleeding exceeded 400 ml. Therefore we recommend an accurate determination of blood loss during resection of larger glands.

To evaluate whether there is a difference in mental function after general anaesthesia and epidural analgesia, a homogeneous group of 40 elderly men (age between 60 and 80) undergoing transurethral prostatectomy was studied. The study was prospective, randomised and double blind. Patients with all types of complications believed to impair mental function were excluded. Long-term, short-term, verbal and visual memory were tested preoperatively, and 4 days, and 3 weeks postoperatively. In conclusion, we found a significant and equal decline in test performance on the fourth postoperative day. Three weeks postoperatively, however, both groups had returned to or exceeded preoperative levels of performance.

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