Incidence of epidural blood patch following obstetric regional analgesia in private Australian anaesthetic practice.
BACKGROUND
Collection of audit data about epidural blood patches has traditionally relied on voluntary reporting, which is notoriously incomplete. The records of Medicare-funded Australian private obstetric practice, which represents 30% of all deliveries, allow a novel method of central data collection and retrieval.


METHODS
Data relating to all deliveries, epidurals and blood patches in private practice in Australia over a two-year period were retrieved from the Health Insurance Commission.


RESULTS
The overall rate of epidural analgesia in labour was estimated at 30% and the proportion of epidurals that progressed to blood patching was 0.35%. The rate of epidural blood patching varied between states from 0.18% to 0.56%.


CONCLUSIONS
Despite certain limitations of our data interpretation, we regard this technique as a useful audit tool capable of generating accurate and robust audit data that might otherwise be unobtainable.
Buettner
A
A
Department of Anaesthesia, Royal Women's Hospital, Carlton 3053, Australia. andrew.buettner@rwh.org.au
Popham
P
P
Morgan
D
D
D015360:Analgesia, Epidural / Q000009:adverse effects*; D016362:Analgesia, Obstetrical / Q000009:adverse effects*; D017217:Blood Patch, Epidural / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005260:Female; D006261:Headache / Q000628:therapy*; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D011247:Pregnancy