INNOVATIVE ANESTHESIA TECHNOLOGY AT HACKENSACK UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER IMPROVES QUALITY OF PATIENT CARE

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Anesthesia Can Now Be Customized to Each Patient'sNeeds During Surgery


Hackensack University Medical Center recently installed in its operating rooms a monitor that provides valuable information that improves the quality of patient care during and after surgery. The BIS® or Bispectral Index® monitor enables anesthesiologists to make sure that their patients continually receive a tailored dose of anesthesia to meet each individual's needs throughout surgery.

The BIS monitor helps anesthesia providers address patients' individual anesthetic needs, which can very widely based on such factors as age, weight, and medical history. With the monitor, anesthesia providers can continuously assess a patient's level of consciousness throughout surgery and make fine-tuned adjustments to the types and quantities of anesthetic drugs administered, depending on each individual's needs. This breakthrough technology enables patients to wake up more quickly and feel more clear-headed after surgery.

"While anesthesia has become very safe in terms of mortality, many patients are concerned that they may not get the optimal dose of anesthesia," said Mark Schlesinger, M.D. of Wyckoff, chairman of the Department of Anesthesiology at Hackensack University Medical Center. "No patient wants to receive too little anesthesia and wake up during surgery or, on the other hand, get more anesthetic than they need."

Before BIS technology, there was no direct means of assessing hypnosis, a patient's level of consciousness during surgery. "With the BIS monitor, we can effectively decrease the chances of under dosing or overdosing by monitoring each patient's level of consciousness throughout surgery, and enable our patients to wake up more quickly, feel more clear-headed, and experience fewer side-effects after surgery," said Dr. Schlesinger.

As of January 2000, more than 1 million patients have been monitored with BIS technology, which is in use at hundreds of healthcare facilities nationwide. Clinical studies and routine use at these facilities, have demonstrated that the BIS monitor improves quality of care.

These studies have shown that use of the BIS monitor reduces the average amount of anesthetic drug administered. This in turn allows patients to bypass the traditional recovery room and proceed directly to a post-recovery lounge with their family. They are often discharged sooner and can continue recovery in the comfort of their own home.

Furthermore, these studies have helped assess the risk of intraoperative awareness or „recall,‰ which is the unintentional regaining of consciousness during surgery. If patients receive too little anesthetic or respond unexpectedly to the anesthetic drugs administered, they could potentially be awake during surgery. Though a rare phenomenon, an estimated one in 500 general anesthesia surgical patients report intraoperative awareness. Now with the BIS monitor, the anesthesia provider can fine tune the amount of anesthetic a patient receives and assure that he or she remains in a deep hypnotic state, unaware of any of the surgical proceedings.

The BIS monitor works with a non-invasive sensor which is placed on the patient's forehead to continuously monitor brain waves. The brain waves are computed into a number (ranging from 100 to zero) that correlates with the patient's level of consciousness: at 100 the patient is wide awake and under 60 the patient is likely to be unconscious, according to clinical studies.

Hackensack University Medical Center, a teaching hospital affiliated with the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey - New Jersey Medical School and a member of the University Health System of New Jersey, is the largest provider of inpatient and outpatient services in the state of New Jersey. The medical center has been honored since 1995 as the first hospital in New Jersey to receive the Magnet Award for nursing excellence from The American Nurses Credentialing Center, and the second hospital in the nation to receive a four-year redesignation of this award. The medical center is also the recipient of the Consumer Choice Award in Bergen and Passaic counties for four consecutive years. Based on a survey of 400,000 people to determine the best hospitals in the country, the medical center was named as the hospital of choice for quality of staff, community programs, personalized care, and overall reputation.