Published in:
01-08-2004 | Editorial
Monitoring sedation in the intensive care unit: can “black boxes” help us?
Authors:
Timothy S. Walsh, Pam Ramsay, Riina Kinnunen
Published in:
Intensive Care Medicine
|
Issue 8/2004
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Excerpt
Sedation is one of the commonest intensive care treatments. As with any treatment, it has potential side effects [
1,
2]. Excessive sedation is prevalent in ICUs, because organ failures result in unpredictable pharmacokinetics and severe illness may alter the pharmacodynamics of drug responses. The delayed recovery of consciousness can prolong mechanical ventilation, increase complication rates and lengthen ICU stay. It potentially affects both the outcome and costs of critical illness [
3]. There is a wide variation in sedation practices between intensive care units [
4]; finding ways to increase the use of evidence-based approaches should improve the quality of intensive care [
5]. …