The effect of event recording home infant apnea/heart rate monitoring in the greater Los Angeles area.

This study presents the findings of 54 infants sent home on event recording apnea/heart rate monitors over a seven month period. The average gestational age was 35 weeks. The number of referring facilities was 13 hospitals and the number of referring physicians was 41. We separated the admitting diagnostic groups into the following categories: Apnea of prematurity, apnea of infancy, apparent life threatening event, subsequent SIDS sibling, gastroesophogeal reflux, maternal substance abuse, seizure disorders, respiratory distress syndrome, bradycardia of unknown origin, bronchopulmonary dysplasia, and Pierre Robin syndrome. From March 1990 to October 1990, a period of seven months, these children were placed in our services on event recording home apnea/heart rate monitors. The average time on service for these patients was 2.90 months, (p less than .07). This data indicates that event recording home apnea/heart rate monitoring greatly decreases the length of home monitoring.