Analysis of continuous oxygen saturation data for accurate representation of retinal exposure to oxygen in the preterm infant.

Maintaining blood oxygen saturation within the intended target range for preterm infants receiving neonatal intensive care is challenging. Supplemental oxygen is believed to lead to increased risk of retinopathy of prematurity and hence managing the level of oxygen within this population is important within their care. Current quality improvement activities use coarse hourly spot readings to measure supplemental oxygen levels as associated with targeted ranges that vary based on gestational age. In this research we use Artemis, a real-time online healthcare analytics platform to ascertain if the collection of second by second data provides a better representation of retinal exposure to oxygen than an infrequent, intermittent spot reading. We show that Artemis is capable of producing more accurate information from the higher frequency data, as it includes all the episodic events in the activity of the hour, which provides a better understanding of oxygen fluctuation ranges which affect the physiological status of the infant.