Ventilator-Associated Pneumonia: Control and Prevention - Essay Example

"Ventilator-Associated Pneumonia: Control and Prevention" is an outstanding example of a paper on the respiratory system.
Critically ill patients in the Intensive care unit (ICU) are not only at risk of dying from their illness but also from secondary related problems.  That is the reason why such patients require constant attention from well-trained health professionals. Failure to provide constant attention may give a rise to healthcare clinical issues. Clinical issues in healthcare may comprise problems such as infections, accidents, severe respiratory problems, and complications from surgery. For analysis purposes in clinical nursing, we take a look at ventilator-associated pneumonia.

Ventilator-related pneumonia

Ventilator-Associated pneumonia is a healthcare infection that develops in patients 48 hours or longer after mechanical ventilation. Most of the typical symptoms of VAP are either unable to be obtained or absent. Some of the signs and symptoms include fever, low body temperature, purulent sputum, and hypoxemia. Hypoxemia is said to occur when there is a decrease in oxygen in the blood.

VAP is a very sensitive infection. According to the guidelines for ventilated-associated pneumonia (2007), 47% of the infections are in the intensive care unit. VAP highly infects the lungs since it invades the lower respiratory tract. The 2007 guidelines indicate that 63% of patients admitted in the ICU have mouth pathogens associated with VAP (Cason, 2007). 76% OF VAP cases have pathogens in the lungs and mouth (Cason, 2007).  VAP causes high mortality and morbidity rates. The 2007 guidelines from CDC reported that the number of crude death rates increases from 20% to 70% and longer durations of mechanical ventilation are experienced. This may create a bad image to the public as people may lose confidence in the hospital. The public expects specialized services in terms of care, prevention, and treatment of diseases and infections.

VAP also leads to increased healthcare costs (Cason, 2007). Much time is spent in taking care of patients infected with Ventilated associated pneumonia and as result high costs. Specialized and extra healthcare personnel also have to be recruited. In spite of the disadvantages associated with VAP, it can be prevented. According to much research, many practices have been developed and demonstrated to curb the VAP infection and its related burden.

There are set guidelines that have been set to help clinical practitioners on how to prevent and manage VAP (Cason, 2007). For example, the guidelines may direct the healthcare personnel on feeding the patient, body positioning, whether to intubate the patient, and on the use of antibiotics. The guidelines also help the practitioners in diagnosing and treating ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP). If such guidelines are well applied, critically ill patients improve their condition, and also healthcare costs are minimized. Even though there is no optimal method of implementing these guidelines, healthcare practitioners periodically update themselves to familiarize themselves with the strategies. These updates through continued effort automatically affect change to the healthcare practitioners.

Conclusion

VAP may prove difficult for healthcare practitioners to handle due to its complications. But recent studies show the number of evidence-based strategies in VAP prevention has been increasing tremendously (Cason, 2007). It is recommendable to obtain a culture way before initiating mechanical ventilation to reduce the chances of patients being infected with ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP).