In September 2011, Creighton University Medical Center
adopted a mechanical ventilation weaning protocol
(Table 1). This protocol was approved based on prior evidence
suggesting benefits of RT-driven weaning protocols,
compared with physician-ordered weaning strategies.
Hence, as an institutional policy, all patients in our mixed
(medical, surgical, trauma, and neurologic) ICU started to
be liberated from mechanical ventilation following the previously
described protocol, unless the attending physician
of the primary service opted out of protocol participation.
The decision to opt-out was based on physician preference,
physician comfort, and prior training. In order to
assess the clinical effect of opting out from the protocol,
we initiated a quality improvement project to assess whether
this decision (opting out) was associated with worse clinical
outcomes. This study was exempt from the Creighton
University Medical Center institutional review board. From
September 2011 to August 2012, a group of RTs initiated
a prospective collection of data on every mechanically
ventilated patient admitted to the ICU at Creighton University
Medical Center. Demographic information, severity
of disease based on the Acute Physiology and Chronic
Health Evaluation II (APACHE II) score, diagnosis on
ICU admission, type of primary ICU team (medical, surgical,
trauma, neurologic), time on mechanical ventilation
per intubation episode, weaning attempts per intubation
episode, need for reintubation or noninvasive ventilation
within 48 hours post-extubation, need for tracheostomy,
and ICU mortality were prospectively collected on a daily
basis.