[Clinical study of the reliability of monitoring ESP during descending thoracic aortic surgery].

We studied the reliability of monitoring ESP to detect paraplegia due to spinal cord ischemia during thoracic aortic cross-clamping. In eleven patients with descending thoracic aortic aneurysm, we observed the relationship between the ESP change and postoperative paraplegia. Two patients with loss of ESP had normal postoperative neurological function but one of seven patients with low ESP amplitudes (47% of the control value) showed postoperative paraplegia with anterior spinal artery syndrome. Monitoring ESP dose not appear to be reliable to detect paraplegia during cross-clamping of the descending thoracic aorta.