2 Clinical Trials for Various Conditions
Ventilator-associated events (VAE) are a scourge of critical care settings and hospital systems at large. There is extensive evidence that ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) and related VAEs increase mortality rates in critically ill patients by up to 50%, while simultaneously increasing cost of care. C Best-practice guidelines state that positioning ventilated patients at an angle between 30-45 degrees significantly reduces the potential for VAP and other VAE to develop. While the intent of the guidelines is to govern patient elevation angle, the lack of a mechanism to accurately measure patient elevation requires that nurses rely on the head-of-bed (HOB) protractor - a tool which reflects the angle of the bed, not the patient - to measure compliance. Depending upon the position and posture of the patient in the bed, a patient's elevation angle may be significantly different from the HOB angle. Critical care teams currently rely on built-in HOB protractors and digital inclinometers that measure the angle of the bed not the patient. Angulus, LLC has developed a dual-component Angulus sensor to fill this gap in critical care technology. Angulus enables critical care practitioners to instantaneously understand a patient's elevation, identify when the patient is outside of the desired 30-45 degree recumbency scope, and efficiently correct the patient's orientation with immediate feedback. Angulus supports real-time minute-to-minute data display as well as longitudinal aggregation of data.
Placing artificial airways in infants is often performed under emergent life-saving conditions, which necessitates a procedure that is both accurate and efficient. Intubations of the newborn are often necessary before an accurate weight can be reported and estimations are often inaccurate. The current national standard uses body weight to predict the appropriate tube depth yet this approach tends to place the tube too deep for the smallest and most vulnerable neonate; and placement accuracy of any size infant is only 50-70%. The consequence of malpositioned ETTs resulting from poor oxygenation, lung hyperinflation, pneumothoraces and death has been suggested to cost $20 to $54 million annually. The morbidity and the financial impact suggest an optimal and accurate approach to place ETT in neonates has not been identified. Other methods to estimate the proper depth of the orotracheal tube have shown promise yet no comparison studies have been performed. Identifying the most accurate method to safely place neonatal orotracheal tubes will improve placement precision and reduce adverse events and their associated costs. Hypothesis Compared to weight, sternal to xyphoid length and shoulder to elbow length, the nasal to tragus length will become the most accurate method for predicting the safe depth of orally placed neonatal endotracheal tubes.