• Stefano Romagnoli, Salvatore Mario Romano, Sergio Bevilacqua, Chiara Lazzeri, Gian Franco Gensini, Carlo Pratesi, Diego Quattrone, Daniele Dini, and Angelo Raffaele De Gaudio.
• Heart and Vessels Department, Cardio-Vascular Anesthesia and Post-Surgical Intensive Care Unit, Ospedale Careggi, Florence, Italy. stefano.romagnoli@fastdigitel.com
• J Crit Care. 2011 Aug 1;26(4):415-22.

PurposeWe aimed to compare the effects of a blood pressure transducer system specifically manufactured to limit underdamping artifacts with those of a standard system on hemodynamic parameter estimation and accuracy.Materials And MethodsForty-three consecutive patients undergoing vascular surgery at the University of Florence, Italy, were included. Arterial blood pressure signal was simultaneously registered with 2 MostCare monitors, connected to the artery either by a standard transducer or a specific transducer manufactured to avoid underdamping artifacts (Resonance Over-Shoot Eliminator [R.O.S.E.]; Becton Dickinson, Becton Drive, NJ). Patients were divided into 2 groups: absence (C group) or presence (R group) of underdamping/resonance artifacts of blood pressure signal. Systolic blood pressure, cardiac index, maximal pressure/time ratio (dP/dt(MAX)), and cardiac cycle efficiency were recorded every 30 seconds for 30 minutes. A total of 2675 measurements were performed with 34.9% incidence of underdamping/resonance artifacts.ResultsAll hemodynamic parameters showed clinically acceptable differences in the C group; in contrast, the results differed greatly in the R group between standard and R.O.S.E. transducer (systolic blood pressure bias, 16.7 mm Hg; cardiac index bias, 0.24 L min(-1) m(-2); dP/dt(MAX) bias, 0.92 mm Hg/ms; cardiac cycle efficiency bias, 0.018 units).ConclusionsUnderdamping/resonance artifacts frequently affect blood pressure measurement in operating rooms and intensive care units and cause severe overestimation of systolic blood pressure and incorrect estimation of hemodynamic parameters when the pulse contour method is used.Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

21 keywords...

hide…