Anesthesia and analgesia
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Anesthesia and analgesia · Jan 2013
Airway trauma in a high patient volume academic cardiac electrophysiology laboratory center.
Providing anesthesia and managing airways in the electrophysiology suite can be challenging because of its unique setting outside of the conventional operating room. We report our experience of several cases of reported airway trauma including tongue and pharyngeal hematoma and vocal cord paralysis in this setting. ⋯ The overall incidence of reported airway trauma was 0.7% in our study population. Tongue injury was the most common airway trauma. The cause seems to have been multifactorial; however, airway management without muscle relaxant emerged as a potential risk factor. Intubation with muscle relaxant is recommended, as is placing a soft bite block and ensuring no soft tissue is between the teeth before cardioversion.
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Anesthesia and analgesia · Jan 2013
Beat-to-beat tracking of systolic blood pressure using noninvasive pulse transit time during anesthesia induction in hypertensive patients.
Pulse transit time (PTT) has been reported to show good agreement with arterial blood pressure (BP) in awake humans. We evaluated whether noninvasive beat-to-beat PTT accurately correlated with invasively measured continuous arterial BP during anesthesia induction in hypertensive patients. ⋯ Beat-to-beat PTT was fairly well correlated with invasive systolic BP and could predict a reduction in systolic BP during anesthesia induction. Beat-to-beat PTT may show potential as a useful noninvasive index of systolic BP when invasive BP is unavailable in high-risk hypertensive patients.
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Anesthesia and analgesia · Jan 2013
Curriculum and cases for pain medicine crisis resource management education.
Medical crises that may occur in the setting of a pain medicine service are rare events that require skillful action and teamwork to ensure safe patient outcome. A simulated environment is an ideal venue for both acquisition and reinforcement of this knowledge and skill set. Here, we present an educational curriculum in pain medicine crisis resource management for both pain medicine fellows and attending physicians as well as the results of a successful pilot program.
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Anesthesia and analgesia · Jan 2013
Estimate of the relative risk of succinylcholine for triggering malignant hyperthermia.
Facilities with volatile anesthetic agents stock dantrolene for the treatment of malignant hyperthermia (MH). The availability of dantrolene at these facilities satisfies cost-utility norms even for sites with as few as 1 anesthetic per workday, based on the overall incidence of MH per anesthetic. We considered the stocking of dantrolene at facilities with succinylcholine alone (i.e., where volatile anesthetics are not available), by using registry data and estimates of the frequency of administration of succinylcholine during anesthesia. We determine the magnitude of the relative risk of the administration of succinylcholine for triggering MH. ⋯ Our results provide no insight into the triggering mechanism for MH (i.e., succinylcholine could in isolation have an extremely low incidence of inducing MH, yet markedly increase the risk when administered in combination with volatile anesthetics). Until more epidemiologic data are collected and analyzed, having dantrolene available, where succinylcholine may be used, is reasonable, and this practice should be maintained.
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Anesthesia and analgesia · Jan 2013
Status of anesthesiology resident research education in the United States: structured education programs increase resident research productivity.
The enhancement of resident research education has been proposed to increase the number of academic anesthesiologists with the skills and knowledge to conduct meaningful research. Program directors (PDs) of the U.S. anesthesiology residency programs were surveyed to evaluate the status of research education during residency training and to test the hypothesis that structured programs result in greater resident research productivity based on resident publications. ⋯ Our findings suggest that structured residency research programs are associated with higher resident research productivity. The program duration and the fraction of faculty in resident research education did not significantly increase research productivity. Research training is an integral component of resident education, but the mandatory enhancement of resident research education will require a significant change in the culture of academic anesthesiology leadership and faculty.