Adverse events associated with procedural sedation in pediatric patients in the emergency department.

Purpose: To determine the agents used by emergency medicine (EM) physicians in pediatric procedural sedation and the associated adverse events (AEs) and to provide recommendations for optimizing drug therapy in pediatric patients.

Methods: We conducted a prospective study at Stanford Hospital's pediatric emergency department (ED) from April 2007 to April 2008 to determine the medications most frequently used in pediatric procedural sedation as well as their effectiveness and AEs. Patients, 18 years old or younger, who required procedural sedation in the pediatric ED were eligible for the study.