Background: Early mobilization of the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) patients improves muscle strength and functional capacity. It has been demonstrated that prevents Intensive Care Unit Acquired Weakness (ICUAW) and accelerates ICU discharge. However, data on mobilization early after cardiac surgery are inadequate. This study aimed to record early mobilization and investigates the association with ICU findings in cardiac surgery patients.Material and Methods: In this observational study, 165 patients after cardiac surgery were enrolled. Of these, 159 were assessed for early mobilization and mobilization status during ICU stay. Mobilization practices were recorded from 1st post ICU admission and every 48 h until 7th day. The duration of mechanical ventilation (MV) support, ICU length of stay and clinical outcome were recorded from medical records registration. Results: Early mobilization consisted of active and passive limb mobilization, sitting in bed and transferring from bed to chair. The proportion of patients mobilized, was 18% (n = 29/159) on day 1, 53% (n = 46/87) on day 3, 54% (n = 22/41) on day 5 and 62% (n = 15/24) on day 7. ICU length of stay was reduced for mobilized patients (n = 29) on day 1 compared to non-mobilized ones (24 ± 10 vs 47 ± 73 h respectively, P = 0.001). The duration of MV was shorter in mobilized patients on day 3 (n =46) compared to bedridden, (18 ± 9 vs 23 ± 30 h respectively, P = 0.01).Conclusions: Early mobilization after cardiac surgery was found to be low with a significant trend to increase over ICU stay. It is also associated with a reduced duration of MV and ICU length of stay.
Introduction: Respiratory complications following cardiac surgery are frequent and have serious sequelae. Diagnosis relies on chest radiography with low diagnostic performance in Intensive Care Unit (ICU) patients. Lung ultrasound is a more safe, quick and reliable alternative method of bedside imaging. Aims and Objectives: The aim of this study is to report the respiratory complications in the immediate postoperative period following cardiac surgery and to highlight the importance of lung ultrasound in the cardiac surgery ICU. Methods: Of the 221 patients that were included in the study following cardiac surgery, lung ultrasound was technically feasible and performed in 170 patients within 24 hours of their surgery and subsequent admission in the ICU. Results: Atelectasis was detected in 71% of the patients, pleural effusion in 94%, alveolar-interstitial syndrome in 26% and consolidation in 14%. Atelectasis was more common in the left hemithorax, whereas there was no statistically significant difference in the localization of the rest of the findings. Moreover, the type of surgery was not statistically correlated with the findings. Conclusions: The present study demonstrates that ICU patients following cardiac surgery exhibit a high rate of atelectasis and pleural effusion, while interstitial syndrome is less frequent. Prompt diagnosis of postoperative complications following cardiac surgery is of paramount importance and it may be made reliably, quickly and safely with lung ultrasound.
Early Career Members of Assembly 2 (Respiratory Intensive Care) attended the European Respiratory Society International Congress through a virtual platform in 2021. Sessions of interest to our assembly members included symposia on the implications of acute respiratory distress syndrome phenotyping on diagnosis and treatment, safe applications of noninvasive ventilation in hypoxaemic respiratory failure, and new developments in mechanical ventilation and weaning, and a guidelines session on applying high-flow therapy in acute respiratory failure. These sessions are summarised in this article.
Patients undergoing cardiac surgery particularly those with comorbidities and frailty, experience frequently higher rates of post-operative morbidity, mortality and prolonged hospital length of stay. Muscle mass wasting seems to play important role in prolonged mechanical ventilation (MV) and consequently in intensive care unit (ICU) and hospital stay.To investigate the clinical value of skeletal muscle mass assessed by ultrasound early after cardiac surgery in terms of duration of MV and ICU length of stay.In this observational study, we enrolled consecutively all patients, following their admission in the Cardiac Surgery ICU within 24 h of cardiac surgery. Bedside ultrasound scans, for the assessment of quadriceps muscle thickness, were performed at baseline and every 48 h for seven days or until ICU discharge. Muscle strength was also evaluated in parallel, using the Medical Research Council (MRC) scale.Of the total 221 patients enrolled, ultrasound scans and muscle strength assessment were finally performed in 165 patients (patients excluded if ICU stay < 24 h). The muscle thickness of rectus femoris (RF), was slightly decreased by 2.2% [(95% confidence interval (CI): - 0.21 to 0.15), n = 9; P = 0.729] and the combined muscle thickness of the vastus intermedius (VI) and RF decreased by 3.5% [(95%CI: - 0.4 to 0.22), n = 9; P = 0.530]. Patients whose combined VI and RF muscle thickness was below the recorded median values (2.5 cm) on day 1 (n = 80), stayed longer in the ICU (47 ± 74 h vs 28 ± 45 h, P = 0.02) and remained mechanically ventilated more (17 ± 9 h vs 14 ± 9 h, P = 0.05). Moreover, patients with MRC score ≤ 48 on day 3 (n = 7), required prolonged MV support compared to patients with MRC score ≥ 49 (n = 33), (44 ± 14 h vs 19 ± 9 h, P = 0.006) and had a longer duration of extracorporeal circulation was (159 ± 91 min vs 112 ± 71 min, P = 0.025).Skeletal quadriceps muscle thickness assessed by ultrasound shows a trend to a decrease in patients after cardiac surgery post-ICU admission and is associated with prolonged duration of MV and ICU length of stay.
Growing evidence suggests that sleep could affect the immunological response after vaccination. The aim of this prospective study was to investigate possible associations between regular sleep disruption and immunity response after vaccination against coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). In total, 592 healthcare workers, with no previous history of COVID-19, from eight major Greek hospitals were enrolled in this study. All subjects underwent two Pfizer-BioNTech messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) COVID-19 vaccine BNT162b2 inoculations with an interval of 21 days between the doses. Furthermore, a questionnaire was completed 2 days after each vaccination and clinical characteristics, demographics, sleep duration, and habits were recorded. Blood samples were collected and anti-spike immunoglobulin G antibodies were measured at 20 ± 1 days after the first dose and 21 ± 2 days after the second dose. A total of 544 subjects (30% males), with median (interquartile range [IQR]) age of 46 (38-54) years and body mass index of 24·84 (22.6-28.51) kg/m2 were eligible for the study. The median (IQR) habitual duration of sleep was 6 (6-7) h/night. In all, 283 participants (52%) had a short daytime nap. In 214 (39.3%) participants the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index score was >5, with a higher percentage in women (74·3%, p < 0.05). Antibody levels were associated with age (r = -0.178, p < 0.001), poor sleep quality (r = -0.094, p < 0.05), insomnia (r = -0.098, p < 0.05), and nap frequency per week (r = -0.098, p < 0.05), but after adjusting for confounders, only insomnia, gender, and age were independent determinants of antibody levels. It is important to emphasise that insomnia is associated with lower antibody levels against COVID-19 after vaccination.
Aneurysm formation is a possible, but rare, complication of granulomatosis with polyangiitis, known as Wegener's granulomatosis. Urgent diagnosis and therapy is very important because a ruptured aneurysm could be life threatening.We, therefore, present the case of a 63-year-old Greek man who was diagnosed with granulomatosis with polyangiitis and retroperitoneal hematoma due to ruptured aneurysm in renal artery and upper pancreaticoduodenal artery. His clinical course was complicated by acute renal failure and acute respiratory failure due to alveolar hemorrhage. Emergency coil embolization was performed. Postembolization recovery was uneventful; no bleeding occurred. The patient underwent mechanical ventilation and continuous veno-venous hemofiltration and received combined immunosuppression and supportive therapy, but eventually died 30 days after admission to hospital from severe septic shock and multiple organ failure.Endovascular treatment is the therapy of choice, especially for patients with ruptured aneurysms that are hemodynamically stable. Early diagnosis is very important, as urgent embolization and early initiation of immunosuppression therapy are the treatment of choice.
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