Sedation Versus No Sedation in a Spontaneous Breathing Trial

Stopped early · Not applicable

Conditions studied: Respiratory Insufficiency

In brief

An important part of how we decide when a patient is ready to have their breathing tube removed is to have a person breathe without any machine breaths while the breathing tube is still in place. We call this a spontaneous breathing trial. Commonly, while patients have the breathing tube, they are given medications to keep them sedated and comfortable so breathing does not bother them. These medicines are often stopped before the spontaneous breathing trial so they can be more awake for the test. There are signs the doctors look for during the spontaneous breathing trial that suggest the patient might not be ready for the breathing trial to come out. Signs like fast breathing, small breaths, a fast heart rate, or looking more anxious than usual may mean that the patient is not ready to come off the ventilator. However, if someone has been given sedation medicines the entire time they have had a breathing tube and are then woken up, they may naturally get very anxious. They may show the same signs as someone who is failing their breathing test, but in their case these signs are only because they are anxious.Doctors may mistake these signs as failing the breathing test and may not pull the breathing tube out even though the patient is really ready for it to come out. We wish to try and find out if patients do better during their spontaneous breathing trials if they are continued on some sedative medicines to treat anxiety or if they do better if the medicines are stopped before the test.

Key facts

Study ID

NCT00366353

Run by

Memorial Medical Center

People needed

2

Starts

2006-06-01

Expected to finish

2008-01-01

Last updated by the study team

2015-05-18

Who can join

Age: 18 and older. Sex: any. Healthy volunteers: not accepted.

You may qualify if…

• Adult age 18 or older
• Intubation time greater than or equal to 24 hours
• Patient is sedated at the time the MICU writes the order for the SBT. A RASS score of less than -2 will be considered sedated

You may not qualify if…

• Acute brain injury
• Pregnancy
• Wards of the state

Where it is running

• Memorial Medical Center — Johnstown, Pennsylvania, United States

Full record on ClinicalTrials.gov

Trial information comes from ClinicalTrials.gov and is refreshed daily. TrialsForMe does not provide medical care and does not run the studies it lists.