A patienttemperature control system (10)uses variable temperature gradientwarming/cooling in combination witha warming/cooling device (16), suchas a blanket, to increase efficiencyin driving a patient's temperatureto a desired setpoint, with reducedoccurrence of and magnitude ofovershoot conditions. In operation,the controller (26) of the system (10)senses the temperature of a patient(12) via a sensor (31), for comparisonto a temperature of the circulatingwater, sensed via sensor (30). If thepatient temperature is not sufficientlyclose to a setpoint temperature, thesystem (10) is operable to warm/coolthe circulating water to a temperaturewhich differs from the patient'stemperature by a temperature gradientof 10 C, or some other preselectedinitial temperature gradient. Aftera subsequent time interval, if thepatient temperature has not movedsufficiently close to the setpointtemperature, the controller (26)incrementally raises or lowers thetemperature of the circulating water, to intensify the warming/cooling effect.This procedure repeats at desired intervals, tomore efficiently reach the setpoint temperature. Thus, the system (10) iscapable of automatically increasing or decreasing thetemperature gradient, dependent upon subsequently sensed patient temperatures.
