Man-made versus computer-generated anesthesia records

A Comparison of Oxygen Saturation Data in Inpatients with Low Oxygen Saturation Using Automated Continuous Monitoring and Intermittent Manual Data Charting

“…7 Furthermore, smoothing effects, the regression of charted vital signs toward the mean or normal physiology have been described. 10,11 Record keeping by anesthesiologists has been shown to be inaccurate, [12][13][14] to the point that Reich and Wax 15 stated in a recent editorial: "The evidence from previous investigations is clear... and is an indictment (if not a conviction) of 110 years of paper anesthesia records filled with 'interpolated' and 'smoothed' physiologic data that are largely fictional. "…”

Anesthesia recordkeeping: accuracy of recall with computerized and manual entry recordkeeping

“…The concepts of accuracy and vigilance have produced strong and conflicting opinions [28-32, 47, 48]. The concern of artifact or erroneous data, especially when seen as a potential risk of exposure to medical malpractice suits has been an issue since the first inception of AIMS [8,25,33,34,37,38,[49][50][51][52][53][54]. The effect of the method of recordkeeping on vigilance of the anesthesia provider has been studied by multiple authors [12,13,15,26,27,55,56].…”

Adoption of Anesthesia Information Management Systems by Academic Departments in the United States

“…2) suggests that 2007 represents a "tipping point" in the adoption of AIMS 9 : 30 yr after the first reported AIMS implementation in the 1970s, sufficient momentum has been achieved to result in a fundamental change. 10 For adopters, expectations for AIMS installations were generally met and included improved clinical documentation, data collection for clinical research, enhancement of quality improvement programs, and regulatory compliance.…”