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Background: The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) Common Data Elements (CDEs) have been generated to standardize and define terms used by the scientific community. The widespread use of these CDEs promotes harmonized data collection in clinical research. The aim of the NINDS Unruptured Intracranial Aneurysms (UIA) and Subarachnoid Hemorrhage (SAH), and Subject Characteristics working group (WG) was to identify, define, and classify CDEs describing the characteristics of patients diagnosed with an UIA and SAH. Thus, “Participant/Subject characteristics” is a set of factors defining a population of selected individuals and allowing comparisons with a reference population and overtime. Methods: Based on standard terms defined by the United States’ Census Bureau, CDEs previously defined by several (Stroke, Epilepsy and Traumatic Brain Injury) NINDS CDE working groups literature and expert opinion of the WG, the “Participant/Subject characteristics” domain has been defined. Results: A set of 192 CDEs divided in 7 subsections: demographics (8 CDEs), social status (8 CDEs), behavioral status (22 CDEs), family and medical history (144 CDEs), pregnancy and perinatal history (8 CDEs), history data source reliability (3 CDEs), and prior functional status (3 CDEs) was defined. SAH is characterized by 6 core elements, all classified in the “Participant/Subject characteristics” domain. Four exploratory elements out of the 39 for SAH overall are in the “Participant/Subject characteristics” domain, and all remaining 182 CDEs in the “Participant/Subject characteristics” domain are classified as Supplemental-Highly Recommended elements. Conclusions: These CDEs would allow the development of best practice guidelines to standardize the assessment and reporting of observations concerning UIA and SAH.

Inflammation is an important part of the normal physiologic response to acute brain injury (ABI). How inflammation is manifest determines if it augments or hinders the resolution of ABI. Monitoring body temperature, the cellular arm of the inflammatory cascade, and inflammatory proteins may help guide therapy. This summary will address the utility of inflammation monitoring in brain-injured adults. An electronic literature search was conducted for English language articles describing the testing, utility, and optimal methods to measure inflammation in ABI. Ninety-four articles were included in this review. Current evidence suggests that control of inflammation after ABI may hold promise for advances in good outcomes. However, our understanding of how much inflammation is good and how much is deleterious is not yet clear. Several important concepts emerge form our review. First, while continuous temperature monitoring of core body temperature is recommended, temperature pattern alone is not useful in distinguishing infectious from noninfectious fever. Second, when targeted temperature management is used, shivering should be monitored at least hourly. Finally, white blood cell levels and protein markers of inflammation may have a limited role in distinguishing infectious from noninfectious fever. Our understanding of optimal use of inflammation monitoring after ABI is limited currently but is an area of active investigation.

The effect of intracranial pressure (ICP) and the role of ICP monitoring are best studied in traumatic brain injury (TBI). However, a variety of acute neurologic illnesses e.g., subarachnoid hemorrhage, intracerebral hemorrhage, ischemic stroke, meningitis/encephalitis, and select metabolic disorders, e.g., liver failure and malignant, brain tumors can affect ICP. The purpose of this paper is to review the literature about ICP monitoring in conditions other than TBI and to provide recommendations how the technique may be used in patient management. A PubMed search between 1980 and September 2013 identified 989 articles; 225 of which were reviewed in detail. The technique used to monitor ICP in non-TBI conditions is similar to that used in TBI; however, indications for ICP monitoring often are intertwined with the presence of obstructive hydrocephalus and hence the use of ventricular catheters is more frequent. Increased ICP can adversely affect outcome, particularly when it fails to respond to treatment. However, patients with elevated ICP can still have favorable outcomes. Although the influence of ICP-based care on outcome in non-TBI conditions appears less robust than in TBI, monitoring ICP and cerebral perfusion pressure can play a role in guiding therapy in select patients.

There is an increased focus on evaluating processes of care, particularly in the high acuity and cost environment of intensive care. Evaluation of neurocritical-specific care and evidence-based protocol implementation are needed to effectively determine optimal processes of care and effect on patient outcomes. General quality measures to evaluate intensive care unit (ICU) processes of care have been proposed; however, applicability of these measures in neurocritical care populations has not been established. A comprehensive literature search was conducted for English language articles from 1990 to August 2013. A total of 1,061 articles were reviewed, with 145 meeting criteria for inclusion in this review. Care in specialized neurocritical care units or by neurocritical teams can have a positive impact on mortality, length of stay, and in some cases, functional outcome. Similarly, implementation of evidence-based protocol-directed care can enhance outcome in the neurocritical care population. There is significant evidence to support suggested quality indicators for the general ICU population, but limited research regarding specific use in neurocritical care. Quality indices for neurocritical care have been proposed; however, additional research is needed to further validate measures.

The metabolic response to injury is well described; however, very little is understood about optimal markers to measure this response. This summary will address the current evidence about monitoring nutritional status including blood glucose after acute brain injury (ABI). An electronic literature search was conducted for English language articles describing the testing, utility, and optimal methods to measure nutritional status and blood glucose levels in the neurocritical care population. A total of 45 articles were included in this review. Providing adequate and timely nutritional support can help improve outcome after ABI. However, the optimal content and total nutrition requirements remain unclear. In addition, how best to monitor the nutritional status in ABI is still being elucidated, and at present, there is no validated optimal method to monitor the global response to nutritional support on a day-to-day basis in ABI patients. Nitrogen balance may be monitored to assess the adequacy of caloric intake as it relates to protein energy metabolism, but indirect calorimetry, anthropometric measurement, or serum biomarker requires further validation. The adverse effects of hyperglycemia in ABI are well described, and data indicate that blood glucose should be carefully controlled in critically ill patients. However, the optimal frequency or duration for blood glucose monitoring after ABI remains poorly defined. There are significant knowledge gaps about monitoring nutritional status and response to nutritional interventions in ABI; these need to be addressed and hence few recommendations can be made. The optimal frequency and duration of blood glucose monitoring need further study.

The goal of multimodality neuromonitoring is to provide continuous, real-time assessment of brain physiology to prevent, detect, and attenuate secondary brain injury. Clinical informatics deals with biomedical data, information, and knowledge including their acquisition, storage, retrieval, and optimal use for clinical decision-making. An electronic literature search was conducted for English language articles describing the use of informatics in the intensive care unit setting from January 1990 to August 2013. A total of 64 studies were included in this review. Clinical informatics infrastructure should be adopted that enables a wide range of linear and nonlinear analytical methods be applied to patient data. Specific time epochs of clinical interest should be reviewable. Analysis strategies of monitor alarms may help address alarm fatigue. Ergonomic data display that present results from analyses with clinical information in a sensible uncomplicated manner improve clinical decision-making. Collecting and archiving the highest resolution physiologic and phenotypic data in a comprehensive open format data warehouse is a crucial first step toward information management and two-way translational research for multimodality monitoring. The infrastructure required is largely the same as that needed for telemedicine intensive care applications, which under the right circumstances improves care quality while reducing cost.

To determine the optimal use and indications of electroencephalography (EEG) in critical care management of acute brain injury (ABI). An electronic literature search was conducted for articles in English describing electrophysiological monitoring in ABI from January 1990 to August 2013. A total of 165 studies were included. EEG is a useful monitor for seizure and ischemia detection. There is a well-described role for EEG in convulsive status epilepticus and cardiac arrest (CA). Data suggest EEG should be considered in all patients with ABI and unexplained and persistent altered consciousness and in comatose intensive care unit (ICU) patients without an acute primary brain condition who have an unexplained impairment of mental status. There remain uncertainties about certain technical details, e.g., the minimum duration of EEG studies, the montage, and electrodes. Data obtained from both EEG and EP studies may help estimate prognosis in ABI patients, particularly following CA and traumatic brain injury. Data supporting these recommendations is sparse, and high quality studies are needed. EEG is used to monitor and detect seizures and ischemia in ICU patients and indications for EEG are clear for certain disease states, however, uncertainty remains on other applications.

Maintenance of adequate oxygenation is a mainstay of intensive care, however, recommendations on the safety, accuracy, and the potential clinical utility of invasive and non-invasive tools to monitor brain and systemic oxygenation in neurocritical care are lacking. A literature search was conducted for English language articles describing bedside brain and systemic oxygen monitoring in neurocritical care patients from 1980 to August 2013. Imaging techniques e.g., PET are not considered. A total of 281 studies were included, the majority described patients with traumatic brain injury (TBI). All tools for oxygen monitoring are safe. Parenchymal brain oxygen (PbtO2) monitoring is accurate to detect brain hypoxia, and it is recommended to titrate individual targets of cerebral perfusion pressure (CPP), ventilator parameters (PaCO2, PaO2), and transfusion, and to manage intracranial hypertension, in combination with ICP monitoring. SjvO2 is less accurate than PbtO2. Given limited data, NIRS is not recommended at present for adult patients who require neurocritical care. Systemic monitoring of oxygen (PaO2, SaO2, SpO2) and CO2 (PaCO2, end-tidal CO2) is recommended in patients who require neurocritical care.

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a major cause of death and disability worldwide. In large part critical care for TBI is focused on the identification and management of secondary brain injury. This requires effective neuromonitoring that traditionally has centered on intracranial pressure (ICP). The purpose of this paper is to review the fundamental literature relative to the clinical application of ICP monitoring in TBI critical care and to provide recommendations on how the technique maybe applied to help patient management and enhance outcome. A PubMed search between 1980 and September 2013 identified 2,253 articles; 244 of which were reviewed in detail to prepare this report and the evidentiary tables. Several important concepts emerge from this review. ICP monitoring is safe and is best performed using a parenchymal monitor or ventricular catheter. While the indications for ICP monitoring are well established, there remains great variability in its use. Increased ICP, particularly the pattern of the increase and ICP refractory to treatment is associated with increased mortality. Class I evidence is lacking on how monitoring and management of ICP influences outcome. However, a large body of observational data suggests that ICP management has the potential to influence outcome, particularly when care is targeted and individualized and supplemented with data from other monitors including the clinical examination and imaging.

The burden of disease and so the need for care is often greater at hospitals in emerging economies. This is compounded by frequent restrictions in the delivery of good quality clinical care due to resource limitations. However, there is substantial heterogeneity in this economically defined group, such that advanced brain monitoring is routinely practiced at certain centers that have an interest in neurocritical care. It also must be recognized that significant heterogeneity in the delivery of neurocritical care exists even within individual high-income countries (HICs), determined by costs and level of interest. Direct comparisons of data between HICs and the group of low- and middle-income countries (LAMICs) are made difficult by differences in patient demographics, selection for ICU admission, therapies administered, and outcome assessment. Evidence suggests that potential benefits of multimodality monitoring depend on an appropriate environment and clinical expertise. There is no evidence to suggest that patients in LAMICs where such resources exist should be treated any differently to patients from HICs. The potential for outcome benefits in LAMICs is arguably greater in absolute terms because of the large burden of disease; however, the relative cost/benefit ratio of such monitoring in this setting must be viewed in context of the overall priorities in delivering health care at individual institutions.

Brain damage markers released in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and blood may provide valuable information about diagnosis and outcome prediction after traumatic brain injury (TBI).To examine the concentrations of ubiquitin C-terminal hydrolase-L1 (UCH-L1), a novel brain injury biomarker, in CSF and serum of severe TBI patients and their association with clinical characteristics and outcome.This case-control study enrolled 95 severe TBI subjects (Glasgow Coma Scale [GCS] score, 8). Using sensitive UCH-L1 sandwich ELISA, we studied the temporal profile of CSF and serum UCH-L1 levels over 7 days for severe TBI patients.Comparison of serum and CSF levels of UCH-L1 in TBI patients and control subjects shows a robust and significant elevation of UCH-L1 in the acute phase and over the 7-day study period. Serum and CSF UCH-L1 receiver-operating characteristic curves further confirm strong specificity and selectivity for diagnosing severe TBI vs controls, with area under the curve values in serum and CSF statistically significant at all time points up to 24 hours (P.001). The first 12-hour levels of both serum and CSF UCH-L1 in patients with GCS score of 3 to 5 were also significantly higher than those with GCS score of 6 to 8. Furthermore, UCH-L1 levels in CSF and serum appear to distinguish severe TBI survivors from nonsurvivors within the study, with nonsurvivors having significantly higher and more persistent levels of serum and CSF UCH-L1. Cumulative serum UCH-L1 levels5.22 ng/mL predicted death (odds ratio, 4.8).Serum levels of UCH-L1 appear to have potential clinical utility in diagnosing TBI, including correlating to injury severity and survival outcome.

A variety of technologies have been developed to assist decision-making during the management of patients with acute brain injury who require intensive care. A large body of research has been generated describing these various technologies. The Neurocritical Care Society (NCS) in collaboration with the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine (ESICM), the Society for Critical Care Medicine (SCCM), and the Latin America Brain Injury Consortium (LABIC) organized an international, multidisciplinary consensus conference to perform a systematic review of the published literature to help develop evidence-based practice recommendations on bedside physiologic monitoring. This supplement contains a Consensus Summary Statement with recommendations and individual topic reviews on physiologic processes important in the care of acute brain injury. In this article we provide the evidentiary tables for select topics including systemic hemodynamics, intracranial pressure, brain and systemic oxygenation, EEG, brain metabolism, biomarkers, processes of care and monitoring in emerging economies to provide the clinician ready access to evidence that supports recommendations about neuromonitoring.

Neurocritical care depends, in part, on careful patient monitoring but as yet there are little data on what processes are the most important to monitor, how these should be monitored, and whether monitoring these processes is cost-effective and impacts outcome. At the same time, bioinformatics is a rapidly emerging field in critical care but as yet there is little agreement or standardization on what information is important and how it should be displayed and analyzed. The Neurocritical Care Society in collaboration with the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine, the Society for Critical Care Medicine, and the Latin America Brain Injury Consortium organized an international, multidisciplinary consensus conference to begin to address these needs. International experts from neurosurgery, neurocritical care, neurology, critical care, neuroanesthesiology, nursing, pharmacy, and informatics were recruited on the basis of their research, publication record, and expertise. They undertook a systematic literature review to develop recommendations about specific topics on physiologic processes important to the care of patients with disorders that require neurocritical care. This review does not make recommendations about treatment, imaging, and intraoperative monitoring. A multidisciplinary jury, selected for their expertise in clinical investigation and development of practice guidelines, guided this process. The GRADE system was used to develop recommendations based on literature review, discussion, integrating the literature with the participants' collective experience, and critical review by an impartial jury. Emphasis was placed on the principle that recommendations should be based on both data quality and on trade-offs and translation into clinical practice. Strong consideration was given to providing pragmatic guidance and recommendations for bedside neuromonitoring, even in the absence of high quality data.

Careful patient monitoring using a variety of techniques including clinical and laboratory evaluation, bedside physiological monitoring with continuous or non-continuous techniques and imaging is fundamental to the care of patients who require neurocritical care. How best to perform and use bedside monitoring is still being elucidated. To create a basic platform for care and a foundation for further research the Neurocritical Care Society in collaboration with the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine, the Society for Critical Care Medicine and the Latin America Brain Injury Consortium organized an international, multidisciplinary consensus conference to develop recommendations about physiologic bedside monitoring. This supplement contains a Consensus Summary Statement with recommendations and individual topic reviews as a background to the recommendations. In this article, we highlight the recommendations and provide additional conclusions as an aid to the reader and to facilitate bedside care.