Journal of clinical monitoring and computing
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J Clin Monit Comput · Oct 2013
Association of intraoperative tissue oxygenation with suspected risk factors for tissue hypoxia.
Tissue hypoxia may cause organ dysfunction, but not much is known about tissue oxygenation in the intraoperative setting. We studied microcirculatory tissue oxygen saturation (StO₂) to determine representative values for anesthetized patients undergoing urological surgery and to test the hypothesis that StO₂ is associated with known perioperative risk factors for morbidity and mortality, conventionally monitored variables, and hypotension requiring norepinephrine. Using near-infrared spectroscopy, we measured StO₂ on the thenar eminence in 160 patients undergoing open urological surgery under general anesthesia (FiO2 0.35-0.4), and calculated its correlations with age, risk level for general perioperative complications and mortality (high if age ≥70 and procedure is radical cystectomy), mean arterial pressure (MAP), hemoglobin concentration (Hb), central venous oxygen saturation (ScvO₂), and norepinephrine use. ⋯ Finally, StO₂ was slightly lower in patients requiring norepinephrine (85 ± 6 vs. 89 ± 6 %, p = 0.001). Intraoperative StO₂ in urological patients was comparable to that of healthy volunteers breathing room air as reported in the literature and correlated with known perioperative risk factors. Further research should investigate its association with outcome and the effect of interventions aimed at optimizing StO₂.
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J Clin Monit Comput · Aug 2013
Use of genetic programming, logistic regression, and artificial neural nets to predict readmission after coronary artery bypass surgery.
As many as 14 % of patients undergoing coronary artery bypass surgery are readmitted within 30 days. Readmission is usually the result of morbidity and may lead to death. The purpose of this study is to develop and compare statistical and genetic programming models to predict readmission. ⋯ Predictive accuracy of all three techniques fell in the Validation group. However, the accuracy of genetic programming (AU ROC = .654 ± .001) was still trivially but statistically non-significantly better than that of the logistic regression (AU ROC = .644 ± .020, p = .61). Genetic programming and logistic regression provide alternative methods to predict readmission that are similarly accurate.
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J Clin Monit Comput · Aug 2013
ReviewConnecting the dots: rule-based decision support systems in the modern EMR era.
The intensive care unit (ICU) environment is rich in both medical device and electronic medical record (EMR) data. The ICU patient population is particularly vulnerable to medical error or delayed medical intervention both of which are associated with excess morbidity, mortality and cost. ⋯ False alerts and alert fatigue remain prevalent. In the coming era of widespread EMR implementation novel medical informatics methods may be adaptable to the development of next generation, rule-based DSS.
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J Clin Monit Comput · Aug 2013
The use of heart rate variability for the early detection of treatable complications after aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage.
High-grade aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage patients are monitored in the ICU for up to 21 days, as they are at risk for complications such as vasospasm of cerebral arteries, cardiac arrhythmias and neurogenic stress cardiomyopathy. The diagnosis of these treatable complications is often delayed by the limitations of monitoring capabilities. We applied computational analysis to a cohort of 24 aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage patients, to identify heart rate variability and ECG frequency profiles that may be potential biomarkers of severe vasospasm, reversible cardiomyopathy and death.
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J Clin Monit Comput · Aug 2013
ReviewTranslational applications of evaluating physiologic variability in human endotoxemia.
Dysregulation of the inflammatory response is a critical component of many clinically challenging disorders such as sepsis. Inflammation is a biological process designed to lead to healing and recovery, ultimately restoring homeostasis; however, the failure to fully achieve those beneficial results can leave a patient in a dangerous persistent inflammatory state. ⋯ Here, we discuss our approaches towards addressing this problem through computational systems biology, with a particular focus on how the presence of biological rhythms and the disruption of these rhythms in inflammation may be applied in a translational context. By leveraging the information content embedded in physiologic variability, ranging in scale from oscillations in autonomic activity driving short-term heart rate variability to circadian rhythms in immunomodulatory hormones, there is significant potential to gain insight into the underlying physiology.