Anesthesia and analgesia
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Anesthesia and analgesia · Oct 2011
Analysis of variance of communication latencies in anesthesia: comparing means of multiple log-normal distributions.
Anesthesiologists rely on communication over periods of minutes. The analysis of latencies between when messages are sent and responses obtained is an essential component of practical and regulatory assessment of clinical and managerial decision-support systems. Latency data including times for anesthesia providers to respond to messages have moderate (> n = 20) sample sizes, large coefficients of variation (e.g., 0.60 to 2.50), and heterogeneous coefficients of variation among groups. ⋯ Pivotal inference does not assume that the coefficients of variation of the studied log-normal distributions are the same, and can be used to assess the proportional effects of 2 factors and their interaction. Latency data can also include a human behavioral component (e.g., complete other activity first), resulting in a bimodal distribution in the log-domain (i.e., a mixture of distributions). An ANOVA can be performed on a homogeneous segment of the data, followed by a single group analysis applied to all or portions of the data using a robust method, insensitive to the probability distribution.
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Anesthesia and analgesia · Oct 2011
Pharmacokinetics and tissue penetration of cefoxitin in obesity: implications for risk of surgical site infection.
Obesity is a significant risk factor for surgical site infections (SSIs), for poorly understood reasons. SSIs are a major cause of morbidity, prolonged hospitalization, and increased health care cost. Drug disposition in general is frequently altered in the obese. Preoperative antibiotic administration, achieving adequate tissue concentrations at the time of incision, is an essential strategy to prevent SSIs. Nonetheless, there is little information regarding antibiotic concentrations in obese surgical patients. This investigation tested the hypothesis that the prophylactic antibiotic cefoxitin may have delayed and/or diminished tissue penetration in the obese. ⋯ Obese surgical patients have impaired tissue penetration of the prophylactic antibiotic cefoxitin, and inadequate tissue concentrations despite increased clinical dose (2 g). Inadequate tissue antibiotic concentrations may be a factor in the increased risk of SSIs in obese surgical patients. Additional studies are needed to define doses achieving adequate tissue concentrations.
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Anesthesia and analgesia · Oct 2011
Malignant disease within 5 years after surgery in relation to duration of sevoflurane anesthesia and time with bispectral index under 45.
Surgery, general anesthesia, and related events have been implicated to promote cancer proliferation. We investigated the incidence of cancer within 5 years after surgery in relation to duration of anesthesia (T(ANESTH)) and also by time with bispectral index (BIS) under 45 (T(BIS<45)) serving as a proxy for more profound anesthesia exposure. ⋯ Neither duration of anesthesia nor increased cumulative time with profound sevoflurane anesthesia was associated with an increased risk for new malignant disease within 5 years after surgery in previously cancer-free patients.