Audit of unbooked paediatric post-anaesthesia admissions to intensive care.

We performed an audit of booked and unbooked admissions to a paediatric intensive care unit (PICU) after anaesthesia over a 19 month period in order to determine whether unbooked admissions were predictable, or whether there were any preventable anaesthetic factors responsible for PICU admission, and to evaluate the necessity of PICU admission in all study patients. Data was collected from the PICU database and from the medical records, especially the anaesthesia records, of unbooked admissions. There were 640 admissions to the PICU from the operating theatres, with 35 (5%) unbooked. Of the unbooked admissions, 71% were considered predictable and 20% had preventable features. There was an appropriate use of intensive care resources by these unbooked patients, with 77% having PICU-specific therapies (compared with 88% of booked cases). This quality assurance tool was relatively easy to perform, however it has numerous limitations hampering future routine use.

Inferior vena cava thrombosis as a complication of femoral vein catheterisation.

Indwelling femoral venous catheters were prospectively studied by ultrasonography to define the frequency and evolution of inferior vena cava (IVC) thrombosis. IVC thrombosis was identified in six of 56 catheters (54 children). Only one patient with a positive ultrasound scan had clinical signs of thrombosis. All children with IVC thrombosis had had catheters in place for over six days. It is recommended that either the femoral central venous catheters are routinely changed at six days or ultrasound studies are routinely performed twice a week in all patients with catheters in situ for six or more days and that the catheter is removed immediately if evidence of thrombosis appears.

Continuous venovenous haemofiltration in the acute treatment of inborn errors of metabolism.

The accumulation of toxic metabolites in children with inborn errors of metabolism may cause acute metabolic crises and result in long-term neurological dysfunction or death. Peritoneal dialysis often provides insufficient clearance to protect against these complications, while intermittent haemodialysis cannot prevent reaccumulation of metabolites between dialysis sessions. We describe the use of continuous venovenous haemofiltration (CVVH) or haemodiafiltration (CVVHD) in three infants with maple syrup urine disease (MSUD) and one child with carbamyl phosphate synthetase (CPS) deficiency. All children with MSUD had a satisfactory reduction in branched-chain amino acids within 24 h of onset of haemofiltration, and are now neurologically normal. The child with CPS deficiency had an ammonia level of < 100 mumol/l within 24 h of onset of therapy, but died 3 days later from unrelated cardiovascular complications. Complications of the therapy included the clotting of one haemofilter and the replacement of two vascular access catheters per patient on average per therapy. Two patients required blood transfusion. We report the successful use of CVVH and CVVHD in the acute management of metabolic crises associated with inborn errors of metabolism, and believe that these may be the optimal techniques for the acute clearance of toxic metabolites.

Impact of pedestrian injury on inner city trauma services.

This report describes the epidemiology of pedestrian injury in four inner metropolitan local government areas of Sydney. These data were obtained from the Roads and Traffic Authority of New South Wales. The spectrum of injury and clinical outcome was defined in patients with an Injury Severity Score (ISS) > 15 admitted from the study area, during a 1 year period, to the four inner metropolitan teaching hospitals. The incidence of pedestrian death was 3.3 times the state average of 32/10(6)/year. An average of 235 pedestrians, injured in the study area, were hospitalized each year during the period 1987-89. On average 24 pedestrians died each year, seven at the scene and 17 in hospital. Fifty patients (ISS > 15) were admitted to the four teaching hospitals during a 1 year period 1990-91. Forty-five were adults and five children. Multiplicity of injury was seen in 68% of patients. The pelvis and lower extremities were involved in 70%, the head in 66% and chest in 42%. The hospital mortality rate was 30% with five patients dying on the first day from blood loss and nine dying during subsequent days from head injury. This study has important implications for trauma service development. Successful clinical management of the severely injured pedestrian requires close co-operation between pre-hospital and hospital care providers. An integrated hospital trauma team response is mandatory to ensure appropriate management of what is often a shocked, hypoxic, head-injured patient.

Improving agreement between thoracic bioimpedance and dye dilution cardiac output estimation in children.

The measurement of thoracic electrical bioimpedance (TEB) offers a continuous, non-invasive method for monitoring cardiac output (CO). For clinical use, agreement with a current standard should be demonstrated. We describe a modification to the manufacturer's suggested data entry into the NCCOM3-R6 TEB monitor (BoMed Medical Manufacturing), which results in improved agreement with indocyanine green dye dilution (DD) CO estimation in paediatric patients. The manufacturer's instructions for the NCCOM3-R6 include an estimation of the volume of electrically participating thoracic tissue (VEPT) based on body weight. We also estimated the VEPT from direct anatomical measurement of thoracic length and circumference. The mean difference between paired DD and TEB CO using the manufacturer's weight-based instructions was 0.69 l/min with 95% confidence limits 2.34 to -0.96 l/min. The mean difference between the two CO techniques using our calculated VEPT was 0.35 l/min with 95% confidence limits 1.50 to -0.80 l/min. The linear regression correlation coefficient between the two techniques was 0.88 using VEPT estimated from the manufacturer's instructions and 0.94 using our calculated VEPT from measurement of thoracic dimensions. The range of DD CO was 0.41 to 8.35 l/min.