Prevention Of Ventilator-Associated Pneumonia

Ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) is the most frequent nosocomial infection in the ICU, and it complicates illness course by increasing mortality rate, hospital length of stay, and costs for patients who acquire it. Therefore, the prevention of VAP is a major issue in ICU clinical practice since it may help improve clinical outcome and reduce costs.. There are numerous strategies discussed in literature in relation to the prevention of VAP The numbers of studies targeting many areas of preventative strategies have significantly increased since the turn of this century. On the other hand, these strategies for ventilator-assisted pneumonia remain highly controversial. Preventive measures of VAP are mainly aimed to reduce oropharyngeal or gastric colonization, and to avoid aspiration of contaminated aerodigestive tract secretions. This review aims to summarize the nonpharmacologic and pharmacologic measures for prevention of VAP. We belive that prevention is better than cure.