Cardiovascular

Emerging Technologies in Cardiac Output Monitoring

Alexander Mittnacht, M.D. and David L. Reich, M.D.
Department of Anesthesiology
Mount Sinai Medical Center
One Gustave L. Levy Place, Box 1010
New York, NY 10029-6574
Tel.+1-212-241-7467
Fax +1-212-241-1847

Email: david.reich@msnyuhealth.org

The whole article available in PDF: 182 KB

Introduction

Patients undergoing anesthesia and surgery fall into various risk categories that depend upon underlying medical conditions and the physiologic trespass inherent in the surgical procedure. High-risk patients constitute a challenging subset, whose anesthetic management must be tailored to provide state of the art perioperative care in order to reduce complications. If surgery is of an urgent or emergency nature, it may not be possible to optimize the preoperative medical condition. Even when medical management is superb, high-risk patients’ are more likely to encounter hemodynamic instability. It is therefore crucial to measure and physiologic parameters in order to maintain stable hemodynamic conditions in high-risk patients.

Cardiac output monitoring has been one of the mainstays of anesthetic management of high-risk patients. The original devices that measured cardiac output required highly invasive techniques, and pulmonary artery catheterization has remained one of the most common methods used. There is a clear preference and trend towards less invasive procedures, and cardiac output monitoring is no exception. Technologies, such as transesophageal echocardiography (TEE), have gained widespread acceptance in cardiac and high-risk noncardiac procedures. This article will provide an overview of the state of the art of cardiac output monitoring technology.

Last updated: 1 December 2002Created
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