Measuring Success of Patient Safety Initiatives: The 2023 American Society of Anesthesiologists Practice Guidelines for Monitoring and Antagonism of Neuromuscular Blockade

This issue of Anesthesiology contains a long-awaited document: the 2023 American Society of Anesthesiologists Practice Guidelines for Monitoring and Antagonism of Neuromuscular Blockade.¹  Academic or “expert” suggestions regarding how best to administer and monitor neuromuscular blocking drugs in the clinical setting have often been at wide variance with what actually transpires in the typical operating room. Certainly, in the last two decades, new tools (acceleromyographic and electromyographic devices) and drugs (sugammadex) have given anesthesiologists important new options. Evidence-based data have continued to accumulate. The exhaustively researched and expertly presented practice guidelines report by the American Society of Anesthesiologists Task Force on Neuromuscular Blockade¹  encapsulates significant progress and should represent the basis for a consensus on safe administration and reversal of neuromuscular blocking drugs in daily practice. While it may be tempting to stop reading after absorbing the table of recommendations, we would urge the reader to delve deeper...