Patient Safety during Propofol Sedation before and after Implementation of Capnography Monitoring

Endoscopic procedures are routinely applied to cancer screening programs and surveillance. The preferred technique is usually deep sedation with propofol being a convenient agent allowing for a quicker patient recovery while maintaining a similar safety profile compared to traditional agents. However, adverse events, including respiratory depression and consequent undesirable cardiovascular side effects, may occur. The goal of this work is to evaluate the patient safety impact of adding capnography during endoscopic procedures under deep propofol sedation. Data were retrospectively collected from patients undergoing deep, procedural sedation for gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopy in October 2019 to January 2021 in a single Turkish university hospital. Included in the analysis were all adult patients classified by the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) as I–IV, who were scheduled for GI endoscopy utilizing propofol alone or in combination. Data on 1840 patients were collected, of whom 1610 (730 pre- and 880 post-capnography implemention) met inclusion criteria. The primary outcome was a change in the composite incidence of mild oxygen desaturation (SpO2 75–90% for <60 s), severe oxygen desaturation (SpO2 < 75% anytime or <90% for >60 s), bradycardia (<60 ppm), and tachycardia (>25% from baseline). Without capnography, on average, 7.5 events of the primary endpoint were observed per 100 procedures and 2.9 with additional capnography monitoring (p < 0.001). A significant reduction was observed for mild oxygen desaturation, with a resulting odds ratio of 0.25 (95% CI 0.14 to 0.46). ASA I patients had the highest difference in combined incidence of any oxygen desaturation of 5.85% in the pre-capnography group and 0.64% in the post-capnography group. Although procedural sedation using propofol is not associated with severe adverse events, the incidence of composite adverse events could be reduced with the addition of capnography monitoring.