EVALUATION OF COMPLICATIONS DURING AND AFTER CONSCIOUS SEDATION FOR ENDOSCOPY USING PULSE OXIMETRY

All events prolonging an endoscopic procedure or recovery, or requirin g a medication or an intervention, were analyzed from a consecutive sa mple of 508 patients receiving conscious sedation. Although 102 events were identified (20%), 33 of these (7%) were major. These included fo ur episodes of apnea and four patients with a prompt and sustained fal l in oxygenation during the procedure; 19 additional patients had a de crease to less than 89% in oxygen saturation in the 30 minutes after t he completion of the procedure. The patients with observed events had significantly more major illnesses, a higher fraction older than 70 ye ars, and a higher fraction of endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreato graphy than those without events (p < 0.05) but had a similar dose of sedative medications, mean age, And fraction of colonoscopies.