The Minnesota Sedation Assessment Tool (MSAT) can be used to monitor the level of sedation of patients in the intensive care unit (ICU). The authors are from the University of Minnesota.
Parameters:
(1) motor activity (based on highest level of unstimulated spontaneous activity observed over 10 minutes)
(2) arousal state (based on eyes being open or closed with or without different stimuli)
(3) nurse assessment of overall sedation quality
|
Parameter |
Finding |
Code |
|
motor activity |
movement of abdominal or back muscles (central muscle group) |
4 |
|
|
movement of proximal limbs |
3 |
|
|
movement of head, neck or distal limbs |
2 |
|
|
no spontaneous movement |
1 |
|
arousal state |
eyes open spontaneously and track |
6 |
|
|
eyes open spontaneously without tracking |
5 |
|
|
eyes closed but open to voice |
4 |
|
|
eyes closed but open to combined shoulder shaking and voice |
3 |
|
|
eyes do not open but patient moves in response to stimulation |
2 |
|
|
eyes do not open and patient does not move in response to stimulation |
1 |
|
overall sedation quality |
adequate |
A |
|
|
oversedated |
O |
|
|
undersedated |
U |
where:
• The following are disregarded in assessing motor activity: cough, swallowing, eye movements, respiratory efforts, tiny muscle contractions.
Designation: concatenation of (motor activity, arousal state, overall sedation quality)
Example: (2, 4, U)
The fact that the scores are not combined means that masking is unlikely.
Limitations:
• A person in coma from head injury, stroke or intoxication might not be an appropriate subject for the tool.
Specialty: Pedatrics, Critical Care, Emergency Medicine, Surgery, general
ICD-10: ,
