[Patient controlled sedation].

Adequate sedation is essential for successful performance of painful and uncomfortable interventional radiological, endoscopic or oncological procedures. Mild sedation is usually provided by the interventionists but an anaesthetic team is needed for deep sedation. A new alternative for intravenous sedation provided by a physician is patient controlled sedation (PCS). In PCS the patient can administer him- or herself small amounts of propofol or its combination to opioid. Spontaneous ventilation is maintained and communication with the patient is most often possible. PCS needs to be monitored adequately by an anaesthetic nurse. The advantages of PCS are appropriate level of sedation and rapid recovery. PCS has proved to be safe and effective during the change of burn injury dressings, endoscopic and radiological procedures. In Helsinki University Central Hospital the preliminary experience in over 1000 patients in the endoscopic unit has been very encouraging.