Audit of practice in Australasian hyperbaric units on the incidence of central nervous system oxygen toxicity

What Researchers Did

Researchers audited hyperbaric units in Australia and New Zealand to compare different protocols for Treatment Table 14 (TT14) and their impact on central nervous system oxygen toxicity (CNS-OT) incidence.

What They Found

Over five years (2010-2014), 8 hyperbaric units reported 38 seizures in 33 patients across 96,670 treatments for 5,193 patients. Specifically for treatments at 243 kPa, there were 26 seizures in 23 patients, resulting in an incidence of 0.024% per treatment and 0.45% per patient. No statistically significant differences in CNS-OT incidence were found between the various Treatment Table 14 protocols examined.

Canadian Relevance

This study was conducted in Australia and New Zealand and has no direct Canadian connection.

Study Limitations

Limitations include the retrospective data collection and the participation of only 8 out of 15 approached units.