An international survey of EEG use in the neonatal intensive care unit.

OBJECTIVE: To examine the extent of EEG monitoring in neonatal intensive care units (NICUs), and to survey the level of experience and training of those using it. STUDY DESIGN: A web-based survey, the link to which was circulated via e-mail, personal contact, specialist societies and professional groups. Survey data were exported to SPSS for analysis. RESULTS: In total 210 surveys were analysed; 124 from Europe, 54 from the US. Ninety percent of respondents had access to either EEG or aEEG monitoring; 51% had both. EEG was mainly interpreted by neurophysiologists (72%) whereas aEEG was usually interpreted by neonatologists (80%). Only 9% of respondents reported that they felt 'very confident' in their ability to interpret aEEG/EEG with 31% reporting that they were 'not confident'. Half had received no formal training in EEG. CONCLUSION: Both aEEG and conventional EEG were used extensively in the NICUs surveyed for this study. Most of the survey respondents were not confident in their ability to interpret EEGs despite the fact that they used monitoring routinely. There is an urgent need for a structured and appropriately targeted training programme in EEG methodologies and EEG interpretation for neonatal intensive care unit staff.

Fast analysis of water samples for detection of anions by capillary zone electrophoresis.

A capillary zone electrophoresis (CZE) method with relatively low separation voltage and short capillary length, using indirect UV detection was developed for the fast and quantitative determination of Cl-, NO2-, SO4(2-), NO3-, F- and HCO3- in potable water samples. Baseline separation of inorganic and organic anions was achieved within 1 min. The optimal carrier electrolyte consisted of 6.0 mM sodium chromate, 2.5 mM CTAB and 3.5% acetonitrile at pH 9.0. The effects of pH and the concentrations of electrolyte and flow modifiers on the resolution were investigated. Two injection methods, gravity and electrokinetic, were compared. The application of electrokinetic injection, using pyroglutamic acid as an internal standard was found to provide a method that is fast, sensitive and quantitative, with an R.S.D. for migration times from 0.1% to 0.3% and for peak areas from 1.8% to 4.1%. The limits of detection were 0.08 mg/L Cl-, 0.3 mg/L NO2-, 0.1 mg/L SO4(2-), 0.1 mg/L NO3-, 0.07 mg/L F-, and 0.3 mg/L HCO3-. This method has been successfully applied to determine Cl-, NO2-, SO4(2-), NO3-, F-, HCO3- in municipal water, surface water and bottled water samples.