Early versus late awake prone positioning in non-intubated patients with COVID-19

 

by Ramandeep Kaur, David L. Vines, Sara Mirza, Ahmad Elshafei, Julie A. Jackson, Lauren J. Harnois, Tyler Weiss, J. Brady Scott, Matthew W. Trump, Idrees Mogri, Flor Cerda, Amnah A. Alolaiwat, Amanda R. Miller, Andrew M. Klein, Trevor W. Oetting, Lindsey Morris… 

 

Critical Care volume 25, Article number: 340 Published: 17 September 2021

 

Background

Awake prone positioning (APP) is widely used in the management of patients with coronavirus disease (COVID-19). The primary objective of this study was to compare the outcome of COVID-19 patients who received early versus late APP.

Methods

Post hoc analysis of data collected for a randomized controlled trial (ClinicalTrials.gov NCT04325906). Adult patients with acute hypoxemic respiratory failure secondary to COVID-19 who received APP for at least one hour were included. Early prone positioning was defined as APP initiated within 24 h of high-flow nasal cannula (HFNC) start. Primary outcomes were 28-day mortality and intubation rate.

Results

We included 125 patients (79 male) with a mean age of 62 years. Of them, 92 (73.6%) received early APP and 33 (26.4%) received late APP. Median time from HFNC initiation to APP was 2.25 (0.8–12.82) vs 36.35 (30.2–75.23) hours in the early and late APP group (p < 0.0001), respectively. Average APP duration was 5.07 (2.0–9.05) and 3.0 (1.09–5.64) hours per day in early and late APP group (p < 0.0001), respectively. The early APP group had lower mortality compared to the late APP group (26% vs 45%, p = 0.039), but no difference was found in intubation rate. Advanced age (OR 1.12 [95% CI 1.0–1.95], p = 0.001), intubation (OR 10.65 [95% CI 2.77–40.91], p = 0.001), longer time to initiate APP (OR 1.02 [95% CI 1.0–1.04], p = 0.047) and hydrocortisone use (OR 6.2 [95% CI 1.23–31.1], p = 0.027) were associated with increased mortality.

Conclusions

Early initiation (< 24 h of HFNC use) of APP in acute hypoxemic respiratory failure secondary to COVID-19 improves 28-day survival.