• R B Hecker, R M Brownfield, and B J Rubal.
• Department of Nursing, Brooke Army Medical Center, Fort Sam Houston, Tex. 78234-6200, USA.
• South. Med. J. 1996 Jan 1; 89 (1): 71-7.

AbstractMeasurement of body temperature in the postanesthesia care unit (PACU) is an important parameter in patient management. Failure to reach minimal acceptable body temperature standards has been associated with physiologic derangements, the application of additional therapy, and prolonged PACU stays. Newer methods to monitor temperature introduced into the PACU have been touted to be adequate for detecting clinically significant changes in temperature. In this study, skin core-temperature-corrected liquid crystal thermography (LCT), axillary (AT) electronic, and infrared tympanic membrane (ITT) temperatures were compared with oral thermistor thermometry (OT) in 205 PACU patients. Regression analysis suggests that when compared with the oral method, ITT tends to overestimate and AT and LCT tend to underestimate oral temperatures. Mean temperatures obtained by LCT (35.5 +/- 1.0 degrees C), AT (35.1 +/- 0.9 degrees C), and ITT (36.3 +/- 0.8 degrees C) differed significantly from OT (36.0 +/- 0.7 degrees C) mean temperatures. We applied Bayesian analysis to assess the sensitivity and specificity of each method, using a hypothermia reference of < 36 degrees C. Results suggest that the definition of hypothermia may depend on the modality used to assess body temperature in the PACU.

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