[Study of oxygenation and ventilation in critically ill children by non-invasive methods]

Oxygenation and ventilation were studied by invasive and non-invasive methods in 31 critically ill children; the average age was 27.1 +/- 12.6 months (range from 1 to 144 months). All the patients were receiving mechanical ventilation and had arterial catheters. We correlated PtcO2, PtcCO2 and StcO2 with their respective arterial values, when FiO2 was 1.0, 0.6 and 0.4. There was a good correlation (p less than 0.001) in the three values of FiO2, but it was especially significant in 0.4 (r = 0.904 for PaO2 and PtcO2, r = 0.905 for PaCO2 and PtcCO2 and r = 1 for SaO2 and StcO2). We conclude that StcO2 is the most reliable transcutaneous parameter to evaluate oxygenation state in critically ill patients.