[Impact of nursing care on the incidence of invasive mechanical ventilation associated pneumonia].
BACKGROUND
Training health care professionals on preventive measures of ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) reduces the incidence of this serious adverse effect.


OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the effectiveness of the non-pharmacological, VAP preventive program by comparing the incidence of VAP in two periods: pre- and post- training of the nursing staff of the intensive care unit (ICU).


METHODS
A comparative, observational study on the incidence of VAP and related-risk factors. Two prevalence cutoffs were used: prior to training (from October 2007 to June 2008) and post-training (from October 2008 to April 2009). The statistical analysis was performed with the SPSS v.15 statistical program, t-test or Mann-Whitney test for continuous variables and Chi-square or Fisher test for qualitative variables.


RESULTS
A total of 69 patients were included in the pre-training period and 71 in the post-training. Age and gender percentages were similar in both groups. There was a greater number of risk factor for VAP in the pre-training period that was statistically significant only in the case of diabetes (27.5% versus 8.4%; P=.004). There were no differences regarding the treatment administered to both groups or number of days in ICU or mechanical ventilation (MV) days. Decreased rate of 6.01 to 1.91 VAP/1.000 ventilator days in the post-training period.


CONCLUSIONS
Preventive measures reduced the incidence of VAP in two samples of patients comparable in terms of risk factors. Nursing education is directly related to the results in patient safety.
Servicio de Medicina Intensiva, Consorcio Hospitalario de Vic, Vic, Barcelona, Spain. martaraure@terra.es
M
M
Raurell Torredà
D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D053717:Pneumonia, Ventilator-Associated / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000451:nursing* / Q000517:prevention & control