Chest
Original Research: Critical Care MedicineClinical Characteristics and Treatment Patterns Among Patients With Ventilator-Associated Pneumonia
Section snippets
Materials and Methods
The Assessment of Local Antimicrobial Resistance Measures study was a prospective, observational, cohort study of outcomes variables for VAP. Investigators affiliated with 20 ICUs across the United States identified and enrolled eligible patients with VAP. The study was approved by the individual institutional review boards associated with the participating sites. As most of the eligible patients were sedated for mechanical ventilation and because of the purely observational nature of the
Results
A total of 398 eligible patients were identified among the 20 sites between May 2003 and December 2004. Two sites were responsible for 43% of all enrollments (111 and 62 patients, respectively). Nine sites enrolled between 19 and 30 patients, and the remaining nine sites enrolled ≤ 6 patients each.
Discussion
In this prospective observational study, we found that VAP remains a significant cause of mortality in the ICU setting, and that treatment patterns for this disease vary widely across institutions. The distribution of identified pathogens was similar to that observed in other VAP studies, including high frequencies of MRSA and P aeruginosa.
There were > 100 different antibiotic regimens prescribed as initial therapy among the patients that were studied. The majority of patients experienced no
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