Daily Sedation Interruption in Mechanically Ventilated Critically Ill Patients Cared for with a Sedation Protocol: Mehta S, Burry L, Cook D, et al. JAMA 2012;308:1985–92.

Abstract

In this multi-national multi-center randomized control trial, the authors randomized intensive care unit (ICU) patients requiring mechanical ventilation to protocolized sedation or to protocolized sedation plus daily interruption of sedation. The primary outcome measure was time to successful extubation, with secondary outcomes of duration of ICU and hospital stay, sedative/opioid dose, delirium, unintentional device removal, and ancillary staff workload on a 10-point visual analog scale (VAS).