Smart technology improves patient-controlled analgesia: A preliminary report

Abstract

UNLABELLED: A new adaptive system has been designed to improve patient-controlled analgesia through the use of a variable bolus dose and a variable background infusion of analgesic. A novel hand set allows patients to rate their own pain on a linear scale of 1 to 10. Data derived from the hand set signals are used by an expert algorithm to repeatedly adapt the drug dosage of the bolus and of the background infusion according to both current pain intensity and the patient's response to previous dosage. To test the system, we performed a small pilot clinical study, using a randomized, double-blinded, cross-over design. The new system was alternated with a conventional system every 12 h. Use of..