[Awareness: a problem in paediatric anaesthesia?]

Abstract

Intraoperative awareness has been reported to occur in 0.8-5.0% of paediatric patients undergoing anaesthesia and, therefore, seems to be more common than in adults (incidence 0.1-0.2%). In adult patients, the consequences of intraoperative awareness are well known and can be severe, in children, however, they have not yet been adequately studied. The causes for intraoperative awareness can be divided into three broad categories: First, no or only a light anaesthetic is given on purpose, second, an insufficient dose of an anaesthetic is given inadvertently, third, there is equipment malfunction or the anaesthesiologist makes an error. Unfortunately, especially in young children, painful interventions are still performed without adequate analgesia, e.g. awake intubation or fracture manipulation under midazolam sedation alone. The key issue is, however, that pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics change enormously from the 500 g preterm baby to the adolescent patient. Adequate dosing is much more difficult in paediatric patients compared to standard adult surgical patients. Solid knowledge of the pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic characteristics of commonly used drugs in different paediatric age groups, as well as aiming for perfection in daily care will help to reduce the incidence of awareness. Methods for monitoring the depth of hypnosis, e.g. the bispectral index, will be used increasingly, at least in children above 1 year of age. In addition to clinical parameters, they will hopefully help to further reduce the incidence of intraoperative awareness.