Arterial blood pressure and heart rate discrepancies between handwritten and computerized anesthesia records

Previous publications suggest that handwritten anesthesia records are less accurate when compared with computer-generated records, but these studies w ere limited by small sample size, unblinded study design, and unpaired stat istical comparisons. Eighty-one pairs of handwritten and computer-generated neurosurgical anesthesia records were retrospectively compared by using a matched sample design. Systolic arterial pressure (SAP), diastolic arterial pressure (DAP), and heart rate (HR) data for each 5-min interval were tran scribed from handwritten records. In computerized records, the median of up to 20 values was calculated for SAP, DAP, and KR for each consecutive 5-mi n epoch. The peak, trough, standard deviation, median, and absolute value o f the fractional rate of change between adjacent Ei-min epochs were calcula ted for each case. Pairwise comparisons were performed by using Wilcoxon te sts. For SAP, DAP, and KR, the handwritten record peak, standard deviation, and fractional rate of change were less than, and the trough and median we re larger than, those in corresponding computer records (all with P < 0.05, except DAP median and HR peak). Considering together all the recorded meas urements from all cases, extreme values were recorded more frequently in co mputerized records than in the handwritten records.