Now starting its third year, the SPS Scholarly Grant supports pediatric sedation-related quality improvement projects, research activities, or educational (teaching) initiatives that aim to advance the mission of the Society. All SPS members are eligible to apply for up to $10,000 to fund projects that should be completed within a one-year period. The first two grant recipients created excellent project proposals that have great potential to advance the field of pediatric sedation.
The first SPS Scholarly Grant in 2018 was awarded to Jocelyn R. Grunwell, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Emory University School of Medicine for her project, “Pediatric Sedation Assessment Tool (PSAT) to Guide Patient Selection and Improve Efficiency of Pediatric Procedural Sedation Services.”
In this project, she worked to validate the PSAT, which scores a child’s risk of failing procedural sedation and needing to be referred to anesthesiology to complete a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) study. She scored children with the PSAT from three retrospective cohorts: 1) successfully completed procedural sedation, 2) failed procedural sedation, and 3) referred to anesthesiology.
The hypothesis was that children who failed procedural sedation would have a higher PSAT score similar to those children referred to anesthesiology and dissimilar to the lower score of children who successfully completed procedural sedation. Additionally, she aimed to determine whether implementation of the PSAT improves the efficiency of procedural sedation by prospectively following children undergoing sedated MRI studies after experienced sedation nurses screened the children by interviewing the parents using the PSAT by telephone.
The hypothesis for this portion of the project was that children with a PSAT score ≥ 15 will have a decrease in same-day cancellations and failed procedural sedations and have an increase in appropriate referrals to general anesthesia. Dr. Grunwell is in the process of submitting the results of this study for publication, but one result of note was that implementation of the screening tool led to a decrease in same day case cancellations. Future plans after validation of the PSAT are for expanded use at other sites to better assess patient sedation risk and improve safety and efficiency of sedation outside of the operating room.
At the SPS Conference in Colorado in May, the 2019 SPS Scholarly Grant was awarded to James Statler, MD, a pediatric emergency medicine fellow at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, for his project, “Intranasal Versus Intravenous Ketamine for Procedural Sedation in Children with Non-Operative Fractures: A Prospective Randomized Study.”
In this study, he will investigate whether intranasal (IN) ketamine is both feasible and efficacious for procedural sedation and analgesia (PSA), compared to IV ketamine, during closed reduction of isolated non-operative fractures, perhaps avoiding the need for placement of an intravenous (IV) catheter if effective. Patients will be randomized to receive either 9 mg/kg IN ketamine or 1.5 mg/kg IV ketamine, and to ensure blinding, all subjects will have IV access established and will first receive IN medication [ketamine or normal saline (NS)] followed by IV medication (NS or ketamine, respectively).
Patients inadequately sedated 15 minutes after induction will receive rescue medication (0.5 mg/kg IV ketamine) to complete the procedure. The primary outcome is the proportion of successful sedations between the two groups. We look forward to hearing about the results of this study in May 2020, at the SPS Conference in Baltimore.
For more information about the SPS Scholarly Grant, see the SPS website: https://www.pedsedation.org/resources/society-for-pediatric-sedation-scholarly-grant/
2020 Grant Timeline
- Letter of Intent (LOI) Submission: November 8, 2019 (5:00 p.m. EST)
- Application submission: January 24, 2020 (5:00 p.m. EST)
- Award Announcement: By May 4, 2020, via letter, then at the SPS 2020 Annual Conference in Baltimore, MD
- Anticipated start date of the project: May 25, 2020
- Funding is for one year—Completion date by May 14, 2021
- Anticipated presentation of project results: May 2021, SPS Annual Conference