What is a BIS monitor?
A BIS monitor is a medical device that measures your brain wave activity, and provides your anesthesia professional with information regarding your brain during surgery, anesthesia and sedation.
How is BIS monitoring done?
In order for the BIS monitor to measure your brain activity, the brain waves inside your head need to be recorded. To do this, a special strip of electrodes is placed on your forehead, and then connected via a cable to the brain monitor.
How is BIS monitoring used during anesthesia?
The BIS monitor can used by your anesthesia professional to help adjust the amount of medications that you are receiving during the operation. By having information from your brain that tells your anesthesia professional how you are responding to the medications, they can change the amount of medication to be certain you are not getting too much or too little anesthesia. Helping your anesthesia clinician find the right amount is very important – patients getting too much anesthesia medication are more likely to have the anesthesia side-effects described above. If you get too little medicine, you are at greater risk of being awake during anesthesia.
Does BIS monitoring help prevent awareness?
Recent studies have demonstrated that using a BIS monitor during your operation is an effective method to decrease your chance of awareness. In the hands of a trained anesthesia professional, use of a BIS monitor reduces the frequency of awareness more than 5-fold. BIS monitoring helps your anesthesia professional recognize those periods of an operation when you need more anesthesia medication to stay asleep, or identify potential problems with the anesthesia medications getting into your body.
Does BIS monitoring improve recovery from anesthesia?
A number of studies involving thousands of patients have shown the additional benefits to you when your anesthesia professional uses a BIS monitor to help adjust the amount of medications that you receive during your operation. Typically, the amount of medication given to you is reduced by one-fifth. As a result of this, you will generally wake up faster at the end of surgery, have less nausea and vomiting, and be able to leave the recovery room sooner. Improving the speed and quality of your recovery from general anesthesia, in addition to reducing the risk of awareness, are important benefits of your anesthesia professional using the BIS monitor during your operation.
Can I request a BIS monitor to be used during my anesthesia?
This would be a good question to ask during your discussion with your anesthesia professional prior to your operation. Currently, there are brain monitors like the BIS monitor, available in almost half the operating rooms in the United States. So there is a good chance that your anesthesia professional would have one available for your surgery. It is OK for you to ask what types of safety monitors – including the BIS monitor – will be available and used for your operation.
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