Educational intervention relating to routine measurement of endotracheal tube cuff pressure at a university hospital

Abstract

The invasive mechanical ventilation support promotes clear benefits. However, procedures involved in its institution can generate lesions in varying degrees. The cuff pressure surrounding the tracheal tube prevents air leakage and should not exceed tracheal perfusion pressure and should not be reduced also, allowing the passage of L ívia Pinheiro Carvalho e R osmar i A par ecida R osa A lm eida de Oliveira Revista Cultura e Extensão USPVolume 976 microorganisms, causing tissue damage and aspiration pneumonia, respectively. Monitoring this pressure, as prevention routine of pulmonary complications, is not held in various intensive care units. Thus, emphasis on preventive strategies seems to be a reasonable way to minimize them. The educational intervention aims to spread knowledge and promote important aspects to improve the quality of health care and the reduction of reintubation rates, length of hospital stay, mortality and hospital costs. The goal was to promote an educational action, through the dissemination of informative tool nonverbal in a hospital environment. Values within the normal range of expected cuff pressures increased from 11.36% to 20.51% after intervention. Thus, the model of educational intervention reached the expected objective, although it is recommended and desirable that other interventions are associated in the future, to complement and emphasize the importance of the technique so that we could obtain more expressive results in this context.