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BAR Monitoring System

Brain Anaesthesia Response (BAR) Monitoring System

BAR SystemThe core product the Brain Anaesthesia Response (BAR) monitor improves on currently used electroencephalogram (EEG) technologies by incorporating the latest advances in our understanding of  how the brain’s rhythmic electrical activity, the electroencephalogram (EEG), is produced.

The approach used is fundamentally different from all other devices currently available in the market in that its underlying algorithm produces EEG indexes which are directly related to the physiological state of the patient’s brain.

Other systems on the market produce EEG measures based on physiologically arbitrary statistical methods that utilise the trial-and-error identification of anaesthetic induced EEG regularities in patients undergoing a variety of operative procedures.

Patient Help – intra-operative awareness

Have you or someone you know experienced awareness during surgery?

 

This horrifying experience – known in medical jargon as ‘intra-operative awareness’ – is one of the most common complications of anaesthesia.

According to the Medical Journal of Australia about 2000 patients annually have some form of awareness during surgeries performed in Australian hospitals.

The lack of technology to accurately monitor the state of the brain during anaesthesia is considered to be the main reason for over- and under-sedation.

Clinical Trails

Remifentanil

Location: 
Ghent University Hospital,Belgium

Remifentanil, an ultra-short acting synthetic opioid, is an important intraoperative analgesic agent.  Being able to reliably detect its physiological effect is an important step towards monitoring the analgesic state of a patient.  This study involved the reanalysis of electroencephalographic (EEG) data recorded during propofol-remifentanil anaesthesia and showed that the BAR methodology, unlike existing EEG monitoring approaches, was capable of differentiating the effects of the anaesthetic agent propofol from the analgesic agent remifentanil.

Nitrous Oxide

Location: 
Royal Melbourne Hospital, Australia

Nitrous oxide, while not potent enough to be a sole anaesthetic agent, is often co-administered with more powerful volatile agents such that the inspired concentrations of such agents can be reduced.  However the effects of nitrous oxide are poorly detected by existing electroencephalography (EEG) based methods.  This study demonstrated the BAR methodology to be more sensitive in detecting the effects of nitrous oxide than the leading existing EEG based method.

Remifentanil + noxious stimulus

Location: 
Groningen University Medical Centre, Netherlands

This trial involves the application of the BAR methodology, and other EEG based methods, to detecting the effects of a painful intraoperative stimulus in the presence of varying levels of remifentanil, an important analgesic agent used routinely during surgery.  Results from this trial are due soon.

Alprazolam

Location: 
Swinburne University of Technology, Australia

Alprazolam, a member of the benzodiazepine class of sedative agents, at low doses typically produces characteristic changes in the resting electroencephalogram (EEG).  This study, involving a cohort of healthy participants, aimed to show that not only could the BAR monitor detect such changes. Results from the trial are due soon.