Our purpose is to verify if different techniques of general anaesthesia can modify the patient's hormonal response to surgical stress. For this extent 35 patients, undergoing Cottle's septoplasty, were randomly divided into three groups, treated using different anaesthesiological techniques (forane, NLA and propofol). No variation was noted between the three groups regarding cortisol increments, while the patients, in whom forane was used for anaesthesia maintenance, manifested less significant variations in prolactin levels. This may be indicative of good forane protection for surgical stress.