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Intraoperative EEG Monitoring in Pediatric Anesthesia

  • Pediatric Anesthesia (R Agarwal, Section Editor)
  • Published:
Current Anesthesiology Reports Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Purpose of Review

This review summarizes the literature on intraoperative electroencephalography (EEG) monitoring in pediatric anesthesia from 2017 to 2022.

Recent Findings

New developments to our understanding of EEG changes in the anesthetized brain, developing brain, emergence delirium, epileptiform activity, and EEG changes during spinal anesthesia will be discussed. Low voltage EEG (i.e., discontinuous or isoelectric EEG) and its association with changes in the alpha frequency (8–12 Hz) band, non-proprietary EEG to guide anesthetic dosing in young children, EEG-guided propofol anesthesia, and a summary of EEG studies to improve clinical outcomes will be covered.

Summary

Intraoperative EEG in children has gained significant interest over the past few years. Despite our improved understanding of EEG changes under anesthesia, and using EEG as a biomarker of anesthetic depth to titrate dosing in children, much remains to be discovered, particularly related to the optimal EEG parameters to use in infants and how EEG can be used to improve clinical outcomes.

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References

Papers of particular interest, published recently, have been highlighted as: • Of importance •• Of major importance

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine, The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, 3400 Civic Center Blvd, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA

    Ian Yuan, C Dean Kurth & Richard Missett

  2. Department of Anesthesiology, Montefiore Medical Center, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, NY, USA

    Jerry Y. Chao

  3. Department of Anesthesiology, Critical Care & Pain Medicine, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, USA

    Laura Cornelissen

  4. Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Laura Cornelissen

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  1. Ian Yuan
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  2. Jerry Y. Chao
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  3. C Dean Kurth
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  4. Richard Missett
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  5. Laura Cornelissen
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ian Yuan.

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Conflict of Interest

IY has received speaker honorarium and consulting fees from Masimo Corp. JYC is supported by NIH/National Center for Advancing Translational Science (NCATS) Einstein-Montefiore CTSA Grant Numbers UL1 TR002556 andKL2 TR002558 (JC). CDK is a member of the Masimo Corp clinical leadership advisory board. LC is supported in part by the Boston Children’s Hospital Anesthesia Research Trailblazer Award and the Sara Page Mayo Endowment for Pediatric Pain Research, Education, and Treatment. The authors declare no other financial or conflict of interest.

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Yuan, I., Chao, J.Y., Kurth, C.D. et al. Intraoperative EEG Monitoring in Pediatric Anesthesia. Curr Anesthesiol Rep 13, 135–142 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40140-023-00562-4

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