While I was at KFSH&RC in Saudi Arabia, a Kiwi friend of mine who was head of the radiation oncology department asked me if my department (anesthesia) could help them expedite their pediatric radiation treatments. It would take them all day to do 4 or 5 children. I got the anesthesia department involved and turned the ‘all day’ into 75 minutes. It freed up 4 of their employees for the rest of the day and the children went home wide awake in 30 minutes instead of checking out in 5 hours and remaining groggy all day. The parents were much happier. It worked so well that we published a study from the cases. It was an easy chore for one anesthesiologist, and the study showed that it was safer, much cheaper, and made everyone happier.
I’ll take any criticism of the data collection as it was my design. We had the hospital statistician do the analysis, but anyone who does these sedations knows the benefits in savings of time and grief. Notice that this study was done in 1996-1997 before it was common to have anesthesia involved with the sedation.
ORTimes 