routine change of nasogastric tube in intensive care unit: friend or foe

Routine Change of Nasogastric Tube in Intensive Care Unit: Friend or Foe

Dear Editor, Early enteral feeding is a standard of care in many intensive care units (ICU) around the world. The use of enteral route is facilitated by the development of highly flexible nasogastric tubes (NGT). Although the insertion of nasogastric tubes has been described as being easy, but can produce unexpected complications.The insertion of a feeding tube into the lower airway is an uncom...

Microbial colonization of endotracheal tube in intensive care unit patients

Microbial biofilms has remained a major complication of tracheal intubation in patients requiring ventilator equipment. The aim of this study was to characterize bacterial and fungal biofilms in endotracheal tubes from intensive care unit (ICU) patients in Ahwaz, Iran. In this cross-sectional descriptive study, patients admitted to ICU that required mechanical ventilation for at least 24 hours ...

Resistance to change friend or foe?

Plasma concentrations of posaconazole administered via nasogastric tube in patients in a surgical intensive care unit.

Abdominal surgery may affect intestinal absorption and the resulting levels of posaconazole in the blood. We measured plasma posaconazole levels in surgical intensive care unit (SICU) patients and tried to develop a predictive population pharmacokinetics model. A total of 270 samples from 15 patients receiving posaconazole via nasogastric tube were measured by high-performance liquid chromatogr...

Antioxidants - friend or foe?

Particularly in the field of advertising and in popular scientific journals, antioxidants such as β-carotene (from carrots) or lycopenes (from tomatoes) and the vitamins C and E are one-sidedly portrayed as substances capable of offering protection against cancer or ageing because they diminish or prevent the effects of free radicals. However, free radicals should by nomeans be considered as be...

Friend or foe

For many years, β-defensins were best known for their antimicrobial activity. However, β-defensins also exert immunomodulatory functions, such as the chemotactic recruitment of immune cells via chemokine receptors. We demonstrated that mouse β-defensin 14 recruits CCR6(+) B cells into fibrosarcomas, resulting in enhanced angiogenesis and tumor development.