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Current Status of Neuromonitoring in Cardiac Surgery

  • Cardiovascular Anesthesia (J Fassl, Section Editor)
  • Published:
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Abstract

Brain injury often complicates cardiac surgery with a wide spectrum of neurologic dysfunction running from evidence of stroke to cognitive impairment. Global or regional brain hypoxia represents the common cause of brain injury as the consequence of a mismatch between the oxygen demand and supply to the brain tissue. Whatever the etiological mechanism of the brain damage (cerebral embolism, hypo and/or hyper cerebral perfusion, hypoxia, and the systemic inflammatory response), the continuous intraoperative neuromonitoring should assess the cerebral blood flow and oxygenation and the brain function. The expanded role of the intraoperative neurologic monitoring in cardiac surgery setting has allowed the neurologic adverse events to be promptly detected. The main advantage of the intraoperative neuromonitoring is that they are noninvasive, portable, and reliable. The current literature, though showing low grade of evidence, suggests that intraoperative neuromonitoring may be protective against neurologic adverse events.

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Papers of particular interest, published recently, have been highlighted as: • Of importance •• Of major importance

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anaesthesia and Critical Care Medicine, Cardiothoracic Anaesthesia and Intensive Care, Azienda Ospedaliero Universitaria Pisana, Pisa, Italy

    Fabio Guarracino & Rubia Baldassarri

  2. Anaesthesia and Intensive Care, Azienda Ospedaliera Universitaria Integrata di Verona, Verona, Italy

    Paolo Zanatta

Authors
  1. Fabio Guarracino
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  2. Rubia Baldassarri
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  3. Paolo Zanatta
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Fabio Guarracino.

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Fabio Guarracino, Rubia Baldassarri, and Paolo Zanatta declare they have no conflict of interest.

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This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

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This article is part of the Topical Collection on Cardiovascular Anesthesia

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Guarracino, F., Baldassarri, R. & Zanatta, P. Current Status of Neuromonitoring in Cardiac Surgery. Curr Anesthesiol Rep 7, 259–264 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40140-017-0229-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40140-017-0229-2

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