Preventing VAC in Hospital Settings

Grace Lee, MD, MPH, associate medical director, Infection Control, Boston Children’s Hospital, discusses ways to prevent ventilator-associated conditions in hospital settings.

Interview Transcript (slightly modified for readability).

“Much of this work is currently in progress, so this is all currently being investigated right now and there’s a lot of work that needs to be done and a lot of evidence we still need to bring to the table.

But in general, the current VAP bundle is necessary but not sufficient to address all causes of VAC. We’re really going to need to take a step back and think about other types of preventive interventions that will help to minimize a risk of noninfectious complications.

The other area that we need to think about is how we manage patients who are on the ventilator on a daily basis. So, thinking about weaning of sedation, ventilator-weaning protocols, and extubation readiness tests in order to minimize a duration on the ventilator and that will help to prevent some of these ventilator-associated conditions.”