Respiratory care
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Editorial Comment
Innovation in Aerosol Drug Delivery During Adult Mechanical Ventilation.
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Review
Noninvasive Ventilation as a Weaning Strategy in Subjects with Acute Hypoxemic Respiratory Failure.
Weaning through noninvasive ventilation (NIV) after early extubation may facilitate invasive ventilation withdrawal and reduce related complications in patients with hypercapnic respiratory failure. However, the effects of NIV weaning are uncertain in patients with acute hypoxemic respiratory failure (AHRF). We aimed to investigate whether NIV weaning could reduce hospital mortality and other outcomes compared with invasive weaning in subjects with hypoxemic AHRF. ⋯ The strategy of NIV weaning did not decrease hospital mortality in subjects with hypoxemic AHRF, but it did shorten the ICU lengths of stay and reduce adverse events.
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COPD and bronchiectasis frequently coexist, which creates an emerging phenotype with a worse prognosis. However, the impact of bronchiectasis on the natural history of COPD has not been fully evaluated and is still controversial. This meta-analysis was performed to clarify the associations of the presence of bronchiectasis with the prognosis and quality of life of patients with COPD. ⋯ This meta-analysis confirmed the significant associations of the presence of bronchiectasis with the natural history, disease course, and outcomes in COPD. The COPD-bronchiectasis phenotype had adverse effects on subjects' health condition and prognosis.
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Respiratory monitoring in patients receiving oxygen therapy for acute care is mandatory at the initial stage of in-hospital management given the potential risk of clinical worsening. Although some patients benefit from close monitoring in the ICU, the vast majority of them are managed in general wards with reduced staff and clinical supervision. The objective of monitoring is to detect early clinical deterioration, which may help prevent in-hospital cardiac arrest. ⋯ Automated and continuous monitoring, in addition to clinical evaluation and arterial blood gases analysis, which remain necessary, may improve the detection of clinical worsening in specific patients. Devices that automatically titrate and wean oxygen flow on the basis of [Formula: see text] enable measurement of several major cardiorespiratory parameters (eg, [Formula: see text], oxygen flow, heart rate, breathing frequency, and heart rate variability). The combination of these parameters into new scores is at least as accurate and well-evaluated, and recommended early warning scores and may be useful in monitoring patients receiving oxygen therapy.
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Several algorithms exist to facilitate spirometric interpretation in clinical practice, yet there is a lack of consensus on how spirometric criteria for asthma, COPD, and restrictive disorders should be incorporated into spirometry interpretation algorithms suitable for use in day-to-day primary care management. The purpose of this review was to identify and describe the variability that exists among spirometry interpretation algorithms and how this might be relevant to the interpretation of spirometric data of common conditions encountered in primary care. ⋯ Of the 26 spirometry interpretation algorithms identified, 5 were deemed impractical for day-to-day use in primary care (19%), 23 lacked a logic string leading to the postbronchodilator FEV1/FVC (88%), 4 relied on postbronchodilator change in FEV1 to distinguish between asthma and COPD (15%), 24 lacked a prompt for bronchodilator challenge when FEV1/FVC was considered to be at a normal level (92%), 12 did not indicate whether the data represented a prebronchodilator or postbronchodilator scenario (46%), 7 did not include a logic string that considers mixed obstructive/restrictive defect (27%), 23 did not contain a prompt to refer for methacholine challenge testing when spirometry appeared normal (88%), and 2 spirometry interpretation algorithms did not include a logic string leading to restrictive disorder (8%). Our review suggests that there is considerable variability among spirometry interpretation algorithms available as diagnostic aids and that there is a need for standardization of spirometry interpretation algorithms in primary care.