Disadvantages Of APRV

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Airway Pressure Released Ventilation was first introduced in the late 1980s, by Dr. Christine Stock and Dr. John Browns. APRV is a time triggered, pressure limited, and time cycled ventilation that provides two levels of continues positive airway pressure (CPAP). It allows the patient to breathe spontaneously without pressure support, throughout the periods of inspiratory and expiratory phases and characterized by higher mean airway pressure. This modality of mechanical ventilation was originally used as a rescue therapy to manage critically ill patients who have difficulty in oxygenation.1 APRV reduces the risk of lung injury and provides better ventilation-perfusion matching, patient synchrony and cardiac preload than other modes that do …show more content…

Facilitating spontaneous ventilation during APRV aids in alveolar recruitment, and improves distribution of lung volume to collapsed lung units. In one year retrospective study, APRV was compeered with pressure support ventilation(PSV) in eighteen patients with ALI and ARDS. Pressure support ventilation is a patient triggered, pressure limited, and flow cycled ventilation, it allows the patient to control the rate and depth of each breath. The effectiveness of spontaneous ventilation was investigated by the use of both computed tomography scan and volumetry for a period of three days.6 This study showed superiority of APRV in providing better gas distribution, pulmonary oxygenation, and decreasing lungs atelectasis faster than PSV. The clinicians recorded the main reason for this finding was derived from alveolar recruitment without overdistention during APRV. Airway Pressure Released Ventilation allows spontaneous ventilation while providing an open lung protective strategy. 6 Dr. Varpula and colleagues also compared APRV with other forms of partial mechanical ventilation, SIMV with PS, to study the effect of spontaneous ventilation in improving gas distribution. They observed no differences in clinical outcome between APRV and SIMV in gas distribution. Authors interpreted the finding due to the long study period and the differences …show more content…

Generally, T_low set closer to terminate at 50% - 70% of the peak expiratory flow rate (T-PEFR). 8 Many studies have advocated setting of T_low according to the peak expiratory flow termination.9 Inappropriate mechanical ventilation setting can lead to ventilation-induce lung injury (VILI). Dr. Kollisch-Singule and colleagues discussed a study where they hypothesized that lung injury can be reduced by modifying specific components of ventilation waveforms.9 In their study, control mandatory ventilation (CMV) was compare to APRV in analyzing the effect of mechanical breath on the lung units for both ventilation modes. During APRV when expiratory time was adjusted to regulate peak expiratory flow rate termination point to 75% , the gas distribution to the terminal airways was almost similar to that of the normal lung. Whereas, in CMV and APRV smaller percentage of peak expiratory flow termination, the gas distribution to the terminal airways was lower and increase "conduction airway micro-strain". The finding indicated that APRV with 75% of peak expiratory flow termination is the optimal setting to achieve lung protective goals.

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