Utilities of the post-anesthesia state derived by the standard gamble method in surgical patients.

Background: There are no published utilities for the post-anesthesia state obtained by the standard gamble method (SG).

Methods: We obtained utilities for postoperative pain, nausea, vomiting, urinary retention and myalgia from 100 adults prior to elective surgery using SG.

Results: 20% of volunteer participants could not demonstrate a satisfactory understanding of the SG process.