Sevoflurane

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A colorless, odorless liquid anesthetic that vaporizes easily and is inhaled to induce and maintain general anesthesia during surgical procedures
2. An inhalational anesthetic agent commonly used in operating rooms because it has rapid onset and offset with minimal airway irritation
3. A volatile halogenated ether compound administered as a vapor through breathing circuits to produce unconsciousness and anesthesia for medical operations

Etymology: Sevoflurane is a modern chemical coinage, built from systematic naming rules rather than from an older word with a long history. Its name is assembled from pieces that each describe part of the molecule: "sev" is a shortened form of "seven," referring to the seven atoms in the compound's chemical structure, and "flurane" is a suffix used for halogenated compounds, those containing fluorine atoms. The "o" in the middle is a connecting vowel, a joining element that makes the pieces pronounceable together. The "-flurane" ending belongs to a family of anaesthetic names. Other members of that family, such as isoflurane and desflurane, share the same suffix, so the ending signals the chemical class to anyone familiar with the naming pattern. The name therefore works less like a word with a story and more like a label that tells a chemist what the molecule contains.

Synonyms: anesthetic