• Andreas H Taenzer, Joshua B Pyke, Susan P McGrath, and George T Blike.
• Department of Anesthesiology, Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center, Dartmouth Medical School, One Medical Center Drive, Hanover, New Hampshire 03756, USA. andreas.h.taenzer@dartmouth.edu
• Anesthesiology. 2020 Oct 2; 112 (2): 282-7.

BackgroundSome preventable deaths in hospitalized patients are due to unrecognized deterioration. There are no publications of studies that have instituted routine patient monitoring postoperatively and analyzed impact on patient outcomes.MethodsThe authors implemented a patient surveillance system based on pulse oximetry with nursing notification of violation of alarm limits via wireless pager. Data were collected for 11 months before and 10 months after implementation of the system. Concurrently, matching outcome data were collected on two other postoperative units. The primary outcomes were rescue events and transfers to the intensive care unit compared before and after monitoring change.ResultsRescue events decreased from 3.4 (1.89-4.85) to 1.2 (0.53-1.88) per 1,000 patient discharges and intensive care unit transfers from 5.6 (3.7-7.4) to 2.9 (1.4-4.3) per 1,000 patient days, whereas the comparison units had no change.ConclusionsPatient surveillance monitoring results in a reduced need for rescues and intensive care unit transfers.

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