Advanced auditory displays and head-mounted displays: advantages and disadvantages for monitoring by the distracted anesthesiologist.

Full Abstract

BACKGROUND: In a full-scale anesthesia simulator study we examined the relative effectiveness of advanced auditory displays for respiratory and blood pressure monitoring and of head-mounted displays (HMDs) as supplements to standard intraoperative monitoring. METHODS: Participants were 16 residents and attendings. While performing a reading-based distractor task, participants supervised the activities of a resident (an actor) who they were told was junior to them. If participants detected an event that could eventually harm the simulated patient, they told the resident, pressed a button on the computer screen, and/or informed a nearby experimenter. Participants completed four 22-min anesthesia scenarios. Displays were presented in a counterbalanced order that varied across participants and included: (1) Visual (visual monitor with variable-tone pulse oximetry), (2) HMD (Visual plus HMD), (3) Audio (Visual plus auditory displays for respiratory rate, tidal volume, end-tidal CO(2), and noninvasive arterial blood pressure), and (4) Both (Visual plus HMD plus Audio). RESULTS: Participants detected significantly more events with Audio (mean = 90%, median = 100%, P < 0.02) and Both (mean = 92%, median = 100%, P < 0.05) but not with HMD (mean = 75%, median = 67%, ns) compared with the Visual condition (mean = 52%, median = 50%). For events detected, there was no difference in detection times across display conditions. Participants self-rated monitoring as easier in the HMD, Audio and Both conditions and their responding as faster in the HMD and Both conditions than in the Visual condition. CONCLUSIONS: Advanced auditory displays help the distracted anesthesiologist maintain peripheral awareness of a simulated patient's status, whereas a HMD does not significantly improve performance. Further studies should test these findings in other intraoperative contexts.

Author information

Author/s: Sanderson, Penelope M (PM); Watson, Marcus O (MO); Russell, Walter John (WJ); Jenkins, Simon (S); Liu, David (D); Green, Norris (N); Llewelyn, Kristen (K); Cole, Phil (P); Shek, Vivian (V); Krupenia, Stas S (SS);

Affiliation: ARC Key Centre for Human Factors and School of Medicine, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, QLD 4072, Australia. psanderson(-atsign-)itee.uq.edu.au

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Comparative Study; Journal Article; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

Journal: Anesthesia and analgesia (Anesth Analg), published in United States. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2008-Jun; vol 106 (issue 6) : pp 1787-97

Dates: Created 2008/05/23; Completed 2008/06/05;

PMID: 18499611, status: MEDLINE (last retrieved date: 2/18/2009)

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

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