Noninvasive respiratory support via nasal cannula in premature infants: Is it really safe?

Özet

With this observational study we attempted to assess whether nasal cannulasoriginally used to administer high flow could be effectively used as an interfaceto provide ventilator generated noninvasive respiratory support. Preterminfants whose gestational ages between 260/7 and 296/7 weeks with respiratoryinstability who initially received noninvasive respiratory support with binasalprongs and then switched to nasal cannula with attending physician’s decisionwere included. Six infants (27%) needed intubation and mechanical ventilationwhile getting noninvasive support via nasal cannula, whereas this was notobserved during noninvasive ventilation via short binasal prongs (p=0.02).Despite the nasal cannula being easy to use and well tolerated by the preterminfant, it is not as effective as the short binasal prong when it is used asan interface in a mechanical ventilator that provides noninvasive respiratorysupport other than its own equipment.