The Department of Anesthesiology at Washington University in St. Louis strives to make perioperative care better. This is not only a goal for surgical patients treated on-site at Washington University Medical Centers, but for patients around the world. One way to improve patient care is to better understand the brain’s activity while under anesthesia.
Although the brain is the target organ of general anesthesia and sedation, anesthesia and intensive care practitioners do not currently routinely monitor the brain during general anesthesia or on the intensive care unit, as there is no standard brain monitor. Many practitioners feel that the electroencephalograph (EEG) can provide valuable information during anesthesia, and EEG monitoring is becoming portable, practical and inexpensive. These improvements in the technology bolster the popularity of single or dual channel EEG monitoring both in the operating room and intensive care units. However, in anesthesia training programs, instruction in EEG interpretation is currently limited. Research led by Michael Bottros, MD demonstrated that, with brief, structured training, anesthesiologists could learn to glean useful information from the EEG.
Inspired by this and by investigations into techniques to prevent patients from experiencing intraoperative awareness (see Prevention of Intraoperative Awareness in a High-Risk Surgical Population, NEJM and Anesthesia Awareness and the Bispectral Index, NEJM), researchers at Washington University teamed up with enthusiasts around the world to develop an educational website dedicated to providing EEG training modules, ranging in scope from basic to advanced.
Faculty members from many prominent academic institutions around the world have participated in this initiative, including several proponents at Washington University. Key to the success of this initiative has been the activity of Washington University medical student, Andrew Park, who has helped to develop all of the modules in conjunction with faculty members and trainees in various anesthesiology departments internationally. The resulting website, icetap.org, which stands for International Consortium for Electroencephalography Training of Anesthesia Practitioner, is now live and has rich and varied content. Practitioners can surf icetap.org at their convenience, and enjoy the creative PREZI layouts, the embedded video clips and the challenging clinical case discussions. We envisage that icetap will continue to refine and enlarge its content and that it will prove a valuable resource for practitioners seeking to bolster their knowledge and understanding of electroencephalography in the operating room and the intensive care unit.