A new deep-learning algorithm trained to optimize doses of propofol to maintain unconsciousness during general anesthesia could augment patient monitoring, MIT researchers find.
A new study by researchers at MIT and Massachusetts General Hospital suggests the day may be approaching when advanced artificial intelligence systems could assist anesthesiologists in the operating room.
In surgery patience, an artificial intelligence attuned to the kind of anesthetic being used can yield algorithms that assess unconsciousness in patients based on brain activity with high accuracy and reliability.
Algorithms can assess unconsciousness under general anesthesia with accuracy and reliability
Anesthestic drugs act on the brain but most anesthesiologists rely on heart rate, respiratory rate, and movement to infer whether surgery patients remain unconscious to the desired degree. In a new study, a research team based at MIT and Massachusetts General Hospital shows that a straightforward artificial intelligence approach, attuned to the kind of anesthetic being used, can yield algorithms that assess unconsciousness in patients based on brain activity with high accuracy and reliability.
One of the things that is foremost in the minds of anesthesiologists is Do I have somebody who is lying in front of me who may be conscious and I don t realize it? Being able to reliably maintain unconsciousness in a patient during surgery is fundamental to what we do. This is an important step forward.
Picower Institute at MIT
Anesthestic drugs act on the brain but most anesthesiologists rely on heart rate, respiratory rate, and movement to infer whether surgery patients remain unconscious to the desired degree. In a new study, a research team based at MIT and Massachusetts General Hospital shows that a straightforward artificial intelligence approach, attuned to the kind of anesthetic being used, can yield algorithms that assess unconsciousness in patients based on brain activity with high accuracy and reliability.
“One of the things that is foremost in the minds of anesthesiologists is ‘Do I have somebody who is lying in front of me who may be conscious and I don’t realize it?’ Being able to reliably maintain unconsciousness in a patient during surgery is fundamental to what we do,” said senior author Emery N. Brown, Edward Hood Taplin Professor in The Picower Institute for Learning and Memory and the Institute for Medical Engineering and Science at MIT, and an anesth