At first glance, the photograph looks like a scene from a science-fiction film or one of those viral, digitally altered images. A woman lies calm on an operating table under bright white lights, a headset snug over her ears. But it’s real and was taken inside a hospital in New Delhi more than a year ago.

It’s a snapshot of an unusual clinical trial by a group of anaesthesiologists from Lok Nayak Hospital and Maulana Azad Medical College. They wanted to investigate if music flowing through headsets during a minor surgery could soften the blow of strong medicines.

“All our surgeries are in completely new environments for patients and we give them general anaesthesia to produce unconsciousness,” Sonia Wadhavan, director professor of Anaesthesia and Intensive Care at Maulana Azad Medical Col

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