Background: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is rapidly expanding across the world, with more than 100,000 new cases each day as of end-June 2020. Healthcare workers are struggling to provide the best care for COVID-19 patients. Approaches for invasive ventilation vary widely between and within countries and new insights are acquired rapidly. We aim to investigate invasive ventilation practices and outcome in COVID-19 patients in the Netherlands.Methods: PRoVENT-COVID ('study of PRactice of VENTilation in COVID-19') is an investigator-initiated national, multicenter observational study to be undertaken in intensive care units (ICUs) in The Netherlands. Consecutive COVID-19 patients aged 18 years or older, who are receiving invasive ventilation in the participating ICUs, are to be enrolled during a 10-week period, with a daily follow-up of 7 days. The primary outcome is ventilatory management (including tidal volume expressed as mL/kg predicted body weight and positive end-expiratory pressure expressed as cmH2O) during the first 3 days of ventilation. Secondary outcomes include other ventilatory variables, use of rescue therapies for refractory hypoxemia such as prone positioning and extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, use of sedatives, vasopressors and inotropes; daily cumulative fluid balances; acute kidney injury; ventilator-free days and alive at day 28 (VFD-28), duration of ICU and hospital stay, and ICU, hospital and 90-day mortality.Discussion: PRoVENT-COVID will be the largest observational study to date, with high density ventilatory data and major outcomes. There is urgent need for a better understanding of ventilation practices, and the effects of ventilator settings on outcomes in COVID-19 patients. The results of PRoVENT-COVID will be rapidly disseminated through electronic presentations, such as webinars and electronic conferences, and publications in international peer-reviewed journals. Access to source data will be made available through local, regional and national anonymized datasets on request, and after agreement of the PRoVENT-COVID steering committee.Trial Registration: PRoVENT-COVID is registered at clinicaltrials.gov (identifier NCT04346342).
Background: INTELLiVENT-adaptive support ventilation (ASV) is an automated closed-loop mode of invasive ventilation for use in critically ill patients. INTELLiVENT-ASV automatically adjusts, without the intervention of the caregiver, ventilator settings to achieve the lowest work and force of breathing. Aims: The aim of this case series is to describe the specific adjustments of INTELLiVENT-ASV in patients with acute hypoxemic respiratory failure, who were intubated for invasive ventilation. Study design: We describe three patients with severe acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) because of COVID-19 who received invasive ventilation in our intensive care unit (ICU) in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Results: INTELLiVENT-ASV could be used successfully, but only after certain adjustments in the settings of the ventilator. Specifically, the high oxygen targets that are automatically chosen by INTELLiVENT-ASV when the lung condition ‘ARDS’ is ticked had to be lowered, and the titration ranges for positive end expiratory pressure (PEEP) and inspired oxygen fraction (FiO2) had to be narrowed. Conclusions: The challenges taught us how to adjust the ventilator settings so that INTELLiVENT-ASV could be used in successive COVID-19 ARDS patients, and we experienced the benefits of this closed-loop ventilation in clinical practice. Relevance to clinical practice: INTELLiVENT-ASV is attractive to use in clinical practice. It is safe and effective in providing lung-protective ventilation. A closely observing user always remains needed. INTELLiVENT-ASV has a strong potential to reduce the workload associated with ventilation because of the automated adjustments.
BACKGROUND: Increasing evidence indicates the potential benefits of restricted fluid management in critically ill patients. Evidence lacks on the optimal fluid management strategy for invasively ventilated COVID-19 patients. We hypothesized that the cumulative fluid balance would affect the successful liberation of invasive ventilation in COVID-19 patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS).METHODS: We analyzed data from the multicenter observational 'PRactice of VENTilation in COVID-19 patients' study. Patients with confirmed COVID-19 and ARDS who required invasive ventilation during the first 3 months of the international outbreak (March 1, 2020, to June 2020) across 22 hospitals in the Netherlands were included. The primary outcome was successful liberation of invasive ventilation, modeled as a function of day 3 cumulative fluid balance using Cox proportional hazards models, using the crude and the adjusted association. Sensitivity analyses without missing data and modeling ARDS severity were performed.RESULTS: Among 650 patients, three groups were identified. Patients in the higher, intermediate, and lower groups had a median cumulative fluid balance of 1.98 L (1.27-7.72 L), 0.78 L (0.26-1.27 L), and - 0.35 L (- 6.52-0.26 L), respectively. Higher day 3 cumulative fluid balance was significantly associated with a lower probability of successful ventilation liberation (adjusted hazard ratio 0.86, 95% CI 0.77-0.95, P = 0.0047). Sensitivity analyses showed similar results.CONCLUSIONS: In a cohort of invasively ventilated patients with COVID-19 and ARDS, a higher cumulative fluid balance was associated with a longer ventilation duration, indicating that restricted fluid management in these patients may be beneficial. Trial registration Clinicaltrials.gov ( NCT04346342 ); Date of registration: April 15, 2020.
