• Stephen McKeever, Linda Johnston, and Andrew Davidson.
• Department of Anaesthesia and Pain Management, Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne, Australia. stephen.mckeever@rch.org.au
• Intensive Crit Care Nurs. 2012 Oct 1; 28 (5): 294-303.

ObjectivesThis paper aims to bring together current evidence regarding the use of depth of anaesthesia monitors (DoAM) as objective measures of sedation for paediatric intensive care (PIC) patients.BackgroundDelivering appropriate dosages of sedative agents, to individual PIC patients, is important to reduce the many risks of over- or under-sedation. Although based on adult anaesthesia, DoAMs could offer increased objectivity to the titration of sedative agents for children in PIC. This article synthesises the current available evidence from studies investigating DoAM use in the PIC environment.MethodLiterature regarding DoAM use in PIC was reviewed, from 1996 and August 2011, after EMBASE, PubMed, CINAHL and ProQuest Dissertation & Theses Database were searched using key search terms.FindingsFourteen original research articles addressing sedation assessment using DoAMs in PIC were identified. The main findings were that DoAMs generally have a moderate or poor correlation with sedation scores and their performance varies in varying clinical settings. DoAMs do not make reliable conclusions about depth of sedation of individual PIC children, and can be influenced by children's age.ConclusionEvidence to support DoAMs in the PIC setting is currently not sufficient to advocate their routine use in clinical practice.Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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