Computer at the Bedside: Recording the Anaesthesiological Process

Abstract

Despite many theoretical discussions are spent in these years on the recording of anaesthesia data on a computer, there are not practical extensive experiences that show the daily use of an anaesthesia workstation. That is a computerized workstation that like an office computerized workstation permits to the user to accomplish the daily work. The systems in use are an extension of the operating room monitoring and its logical is to add an anaesthetic form to patient vital signals trends. These systems have not a preoperative visit collected at patient’s bed or postoperative printed orders to give to the ward. Then the anaesthesia information management is not performed with a complete computerized approach. This paper shows the problems and the technique to build an “anaesthesia toolkit”, a collection of anaesthesiological dedicated software. We will review:

• 1. The “circulation” of anaesthesiological information: the anaesthesia information closed loop.

• 2. The anaesthesia workgroup and the computerized anaesthesia toolkit.

• 3. The computerized anaesthesia toolkit in daily routine use: the ten-year experience of the Buccheri La Ferla Hospital.