Application of a hand-held computer for data capture in the operating room

In this paper, the use of a battery-powered, handheld computer system (HHC) for the capture of drug and events (D&E) during anesthesia and surgery is described. The advantages of the HHC system are small size, non-volatile memory, flexible keyboard configuration-every key can be a special function key labeled with custom overlays, fast entry of D&E with accurate time of day and provision of a pulse signal to external trend recorders logging each real-time entry. Disadvantages are limited processing speed that can inhibit complex operations such as long searches for a particular drug entry and some training is required to become a proficient user.