Competency: 6

Details

Record an EEG on the unconscious patient in the intensive care setting, identifying and rectifying the non- pathological features and recognising the common EEG features observed in intensive care recordings (eg burst suppression)

Considerations

• The importance of a range of control settings and of reviewing throughout the recording
• The principle and importance of placing electrodes and confirming the contact impedances are appropriate to the patient in the clinical context of the intensive care setting
• Principles of derivation of montages (referential and bipolar) and electrode placement used for EEG in the intensive care setting
• The importance of electrode impedance and its effects
• Correct recording parameters
• Requirements and principles of recording the EEG in the intensive care setting, including identifying and eliminating biological and non- biological artefacts, in particular the environmental challenges
• The use and effects of painful, auditory and tactile stimulation
• The need to modify or extend the current investigation
• Annotation of ongoing recording
• Recognition of and correct response to clinical events
• The effects of sedation on the EEG

Relevant learning outcomes