Preoxygenation for Tracheal Aspirations in Intensive Care, a Randomized Controlled Trial

Clearing the airways is a complex phenomenon involving the production of secretions, the nature of mucus (viscosity, elasticity, stringiness, and adhesiveness), ciliary movement, and coughing. Endotracheal suctioning are performed when the patient is "unable to clear the airways of obstructions hindering the free passage of air." Classically, endotracheal suctioning cause transient desaturation exacerbated by a decrease in cardiac output due to an increase in mean arterial pressure, promoting cardiac arrhythmias. To minimize these effects, it is recommended to perform additional preoxygenation, i.e., increasing the fraction of O2 in the air delivered to the patient by the ventilator 2-3 minutes before the procedure. These longstanding recommendations were reiterated in 2022, based on outdated studies involving systematic suctioning and/or disconnecting the patient from the ventilator.

Today, suctioning are performed on-demand, based on the patient's congestion status, either through the endotracheal tube cap or a "closed system." Desaturations have become rare without establishing that additional preoxygenation can prevent them. Moreover, additional preoxygenation is not without risks. In the short term, it induces de-nitrogenation atelectasis resulting in a loss of lung volume that can worsen pre-existing lung injuries in the most severe patients. In less severe cases, preoxygenation is responsible for transient hyperoxia, with various deleterious effects impacting patient prognosis. Thus, a short-term risk, such as deep desaturations, is juxtaposed with a medium-term risk of hyperoxia and de-nitrogenation.

The investigators hypothesize that the absence of additional preoxygenation is not inferior, in terms of deep desaturations, to the strategy with additional preoxygenation, and it would avoid exposing patients to the risks of de-nitrogenation-induced atelectasis and hyperoxia.

The investigators retained a margin of non-inferiority for the relative risk of 1.1, i.e. an increase of 10% of deep desaturations.

The main analysis will be performed on the per-protocol population (more conservative in non-inferiority trials).The per-protocol population will include patients who had at least one suctioning and for whom the additional preoxygenation strategy allocated by randomisation was followed in at least 70% of all suctioning reported in the patient's care record. Patients who stopped their participation in the study before endpoint timeframe and those who had never had an suctioning will not be included in the per protocol population.