A Computerized Interpretation of Arterial pH and Blood Gas Data: Do Physicians Need It?

Abstract

To evaluate the need for a program of computerized interpretation of arterial pH and blood gas data in our institution, we first asked the audience at a medical grand rounds conference to fill out a self-assessment questionnaire on their knowledge of various acid-base and gas-exchange concepts and their opinion of such a program; we then surprised them with a quiz and compared their questionnaire responses with their quiz results and their quiz results with our computer program's quiz results. Although 61% of our study group thought that they knew the concepts that we considered necessary in interpreting arterial pH and blood gas data, and 71% of our study group thought that such a program was unnecessary, our audience was able to correctly answer only 39% of the questions. We concluded that not only were the members of our audience not very knowledgeable in interpreting arterial pH and blood gas data, but they were also not aware of their own limitations. Our results imply that physicians who are not specialists in acid-base problems probably do need a computerized interpretation of acid-base and gas-exchange data to ensure uniform quality of patient care.