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Departments should have a policy on how to care for patients with additional needs including those covered under the Equality Act, and consider appointing an assigned lead anaesthetist with time in their job plan for the role.^274,275 The policy should incorporate preassessment, deprivation of liberty assessment, consent, pathways to minimise anxiety and considerations for analgesia and discharge planning.²⁸¹

Appropriate staffing levels and skill mix should be provided in all units: multispecialty general hospitals, isolated units and large single-specialty centres delivering ophthalmic anaesthesia. For most operating sessions this should include surgeon, anaesthetist, two theatre-trained scrub practitioners, one trained nurse or operating department practitioner to assist with local anaesthesia/patient monitoring and one theatre support worker/runner.^2,3 

A minimum of two members of staff should be present (of whom at least one should be a registered practitioner) when there is a patient in the PACU who does not fulfil the criteria for discharge to the ward. If this level of staffing cannot be assured, an anaesthetist should stay with the patient until satisfied that the patient fulfils...

There must be the ability to provide the patient with the appropriate chaperone, as per GMC guidance on intimate examinations and chaperones.¹¹ When examining a patient, anaesthetists must be sensitive to what the patient may consider as intimate, which could include any examination where it is necessary to touch or even be close to the patient.

Patients requiring planned or emergency burn surgery should be cared for by theatre staff with current experience in burn care.⁴ Anaesthetists who provide emergency care outside burn services should be trained to manage the initial treatment of the patient with severe burns, including timely emergency assessment, resuscitation and transfer to a burns service.

Patients requiring planned or emergency burn surgery should be cared for by theatre staff with current experience in burn care.⁴Anaesthetists who provide emergency care outside burn services should be trained to manage the initial treatment of the patient with severe burns, including timely emergency assessment, resuscitation and transfer to a burns service.

The lead obstetric anaesthetist should be responsible for the overall delivery of the service, which includes ensuring that evidence-based guidelines and protocols are in use and are up to date; monitoring staff training, workforce planning, and service risk management; and ensuring that national specifications are met, and auditing the service against these agreed standards, including anaesthetic complication rates. 

As a basic minimum for any obstetric unit, a consultant anaesthetist should be allocated to ensure consultant cover for the full daytime working week (that is, ensuring that Monday to Friday, morning and afternoon sessions are staffed).²⁴ This is to provide urgent and emergency care, not to undertake elective work.