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224 active trials for Critical Illness

Nutritional Status, Muscle Wasting and Fraility in Intensive Care Patients

The risk of muscle wasting is high in the intensive care unit patients during the treatment process and this condition is associated with adverse clinical outcomes. The etiology of muscle wasting is multifactorial and medical nutrition therapy plays a key role in muscle wasting treatment and prevention. The aim of this study is assesing the malnutrition and fraility, anthropometric measurements, and muscle mass by ultrasound at the first admission to the intensive care unit and to determine the nutritional factors affecting clinical outcomes. In addition, it is planned to determine the risk factors affecting the change of anthropometric measurements and muscle wasting in the first week during the intensive care unit.

Start: October 2020

The VITDALIZE Study: Effect of High-dose Vitamin D3 on 28-day Mortality in Adult Critically Ill Patients

In the VITdAL-ICU trial using a large oral dose of vitamin D3 in 480 adult critically ill patients, there was no benefit regarding the primary endpoint hospital length of stay. However, the predefined subgroup with severe vitamin D deficiency (25(OH)D ? 12ng/ml) had significantly lower 28-day mortality (36.3% placebo vs. 20.4% vitamin D group, hazard ratio (HR) 0.52 (0.30-0.89), number needed to treat = 6). Therefore, high-dose vitamin D3 in a population of severely vitamin D deficient critically ill patients is a promising and inexpensive intervention that requires confirmatory multicenter studies. To date, only 7 interventions (e.g. noninvasive ventilation or prone positioning) have ever demonstrated mortality benefit for Intensive Care Unit (ICU) patients in multicenter trials. In case of benefit, vitamin D treatment in critically ill patients could be immediately implemented worldwide.

Start: October 2017

Effect of Packed Red Blood Cell Transfusion on Eicosanoid Profiles in Plasma of Intensive Care Patients

The main goal of this pilot study is to assess the time course of eicosanoid profiles in intensive care unit (ICU) patients requiring packed red blood cell (PRBC) transfusion. Moreover we will analyze the change of levels of eicosanoids in patient plasma prior and after a PRBC transfusion as well as its correlation with levels of eicosanoids in the transfused PRBCs. These data will then be used to determine the estimated effect size necessary for the planning of future larger studies. We hypothesize that transfusion of PRBCs will modulate the eicosanoid profile in ICU patients.

Start: December 2018

Application of Prophylactic Low Calorie Feeding in Critically Ill Patients With High-risk Refeeding Syndrome

Critically ill patients with high-risk nutrition are often at risk of refeeding syndrome(RFS), that the incidence of RFS is as high as 30-50%. It is sure that patients with refeeding syndrome were treated with restrictive enteral nutrition, but the definition of refeeding syndrome is not uniform, and there is still a lack of awareness high-risk patients of RFS to receiving early empirical low-calorie feeding intervention. So, we designed the study which is divided into three stages. Firstly, the monitoring rate of RFS was reviewed to evaluate the incidence of RFS in general ICU. Secondly, the best diagnostic criteria of RFS were prospectively defined. Finally, on this basis, it is assessed whether early low-calorie feeding could improve prognosis in high-risk patients with RFS.

Start: July 2019

MICU Recovery Clinic

Summary: Emerging data demonstrate long-term morbidity and mortality in those who survive critical illness. However, there is no data regarding long-term follow-up for ICU survivors. The investigators have begun the implementation of an ICU recovery clinic. Rationale: ICU survivors are at high risk for functional, cognitive and psychiatric impairments. However, methods to mitigate these impairments and improve recovery are lacking. Special follow-up clinics for survivors of critical illness have been proposed and implemented to some degree, but are uncommon.

Start: July 2015

Selective Decontamination of the Digestive Tract in Intensive Care Unit Patients

Introduction- Hospital acquired infections (HAI) are a major cause of morbidity and mortality and increase health care costs. Critically ill patients are particularly susceptible to these infections and have an even higher mortality. One intervention that has gained much interest in the medical literature for reducing infection rates and deaths from HAIs is selective decontamination of the digestive tract (SDD). SDD involves the application of antibiotic paste to the mouth, throat, stomach and a short course of intravenous antibiotics. The evidence supporting the use of SDD for saving lives and preventing infections is actually quite strong. However, health care professionals in many parts of the world have refrained from using SDD due to fears of the effects of overuse of antibiotics on the frequency of infections with resistant bacteria such as multi-resistant Gram negative organisms, MRSA and Clostridium difficile. SuDDICU is a cross-over, cluster randomised trial comparing the effect of using selective decontamination of the digestive tract (SDD) plus standard care, to standard care alone on hospital mortality in patients receiving mechanical ventilation in the intensive care unit (ICU). Secondary outcomes include an ecological assessment and a long-term health economic analysis.

Start: May 2017

Outcomes and Prognostic Factors in COVID-19

The primary aim is to study the short-term outcome of elderly ICU patients (? 70 years) suffering from COVID-19 using a multicenter and multi-national approach The secondary aim is to investigate the properties of a simple frailty index in this cohort, and in particular if this is an instrument that can be used in resource and outcome prediction in this group To create hypothesis for further studies, in particular on various outcome prediction To create hypothesis for further studies, in particular on various outcome prediction

Start: March 2020

Psychological Impact of COVID-19 Outbreak on Caregivers

Based on the experience of previous pandemics, countries reacted by applying different upgrade strategies to prevent or delay the widespread of the disease. Therefore, measures such as border closure, school closure, restrict social gathering (even shutdown of workplaces), limit population movements, and confinement meaning quarantines at the scale of cities or regions. In public hospitals, several measures have been decided to concentrate the power of care on potential wave of admissions of patients with severe forms of Covid-19. In this purpose, the number of available beds in Intensive Care Units (ICU) has been increased by two-fold and scheduled non-emergency surgical procedure have been cancelled. That means: For the most severe patients, new personals (physician such as anesthesiologists, nurses of other units) have been transferred in ICUs. For the less severe patients, personals of non-busy units have been transferred in busier ones. All these measures lead to major daily-life change sets that could be stressful. In the general population, it has been well documented that quarantine or confinement or isolation could lead to the occurrence of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) syndrome in about 30% overall population. Importantly, high depressive symptoms have been reported in 9% of hospital staff. Numerous symptoms have been reported after quarantine or isolation such as emotional disturbance, depression, stress, low mood, irritability, insomnia, and post-traumatic stress symptoms. In hospital setting, few studies have been performed for assessing the psychological impact of quarantine and isolation. However, two studies reported a high prevalence of burn-out syndrome (BOS) in ICU physician and PTSD syndrome and depression in ICU nurses. As the consequences of all the measures decided and applied during Covid-19 pandemic could be important on caregivers, the present study primarily aims at assessing the prevalence of PTSD syndrome in a large population of caregivers implied or not in Intensive Care Units. The secondary objective were 1) to assess the prevalence of severe depression and anxiety and BOS 2) to isolate potential factors associated with PTSD, severe depression, anxiety or BOS.

Start: January 2021

Does Extra-Corporeal Membrane Oxygenation Alter Antiinfectives Therapy Pharmacokinetics in Critically Ill Patients

Observational study Primary Objective: To study whether ECMO alters the PK of anti-infectives including voriconazole, posaconazole and caspofungin in critically ill patients on ECMO Secondary Objectives: Develop Population PK models of anti-infectives, including voriconazole, posaconazole and caspofungin in critically ill patients on ECMO Develop Physiological-Based PK (PBPK) model of anti-infectives, including: voriconazole, posaconazole and caspofungin in critically ill patients on ECMO Study population: Critically ill patients on ECMO Methodology: Observational study to determine whether ECMO alters the PK of anti-infectives, by developing PK models This is a non-interventional descriptive study in that the anti-infective drug selection and dosing will be at the discretion of the clinician, based on the clinical context and unit guidelines. Doses will be reconstituted and administered as per local hospital protocols in line with patient's routine care. Patients will be asked to provide additional blood samples over the course of the anti-infective dosing schedule, these samples will be taken from existing arterial lines to help guide treatment in future patients on ECMO receiving these anti-infectives.

Start: September 2018

Bolus Versus Continuous Infusion of Meropenem

This study arises from the need to optimize antibacterial drug usage to face increasing drug resistance among gram-negative pathogens in intensive care units. Gram-negative organisms are responsible for 70% of drug-resistant infections acquired in the intensive care unit. Meropenem is a ?-lactam, carbapenem, antibacterial agent usually administered by intermittent infusion. As ?-lactam efficacy is determined by the time in which the drug concentration exceeds the minimum inhibiting concentration of the target pathogen, intermittent infusion of this short half-lived drug can lead to precipitous drops in serum drug levels, an occurrence linked to emergence of resistant pathogens. The investigators hypothesize a beneficial effect of a continuous meropenem infusion on mortality and emergence of drug resistant pathogens. All patients enrolled will receive 1 g of meropenem bolus. After that, subjects will be randomized to receive a continuous infusion of study drug 3g/day or a bolus administration of the same amount of drugs. The investigators expect a reduction of mortality and emergence of extensive or pan drug resistant pathogens from 52 to 40% in the continuous infusion group.

Start: June 2018

Intensive Nutrition in Critically Ill Adults

Despite the widespread use of nutrition therapy, no large scale randomized controlled trials (RCTs) have demonstrated positive outcomes with delivery of nutrition therapy early in critical illness, with some showing no effect with delayed nutrition or even harm. There are several possible reasons for the lack of observed benefit from RCTs to date; interventions have been short in duration (usually 3-10 days after intensive care unit (ICU) admission), perhaps applied at the incorrect time in regards to the patients metabolism and recovery, do not consider the patients nutrition risk, and have not addressed what happens to nutrition intake post ICU in critically ill individuals. This may explain why RCTs to date have not observed any positive associations with the delivery of nutrition; our focus to date may have been on the wrong stage of illness. A future study is thus urgently needed, which addresses the deficiencies in current RCTs by optimizing nutrition delivery for the whole hospital stay and collecting meaningful clinical, process and outcome data, which will potentially inform a larger trial of a similar nature. This initial study aims to determine whether optimization of energy using a pre-tested supplemental parenteral nutrition (PN) strategy in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and an intensive nutrition intervention in the post ICU period will deliver more total energy than standard nutrition care during hospital admission in a group of critically ill patients with at least one organ system failure.

Start: October 2018

The Effect of Higher Protein Dosing in Critically Ill Patients

The investigator will investigate the effects of higher protein/amino acid dosing (?2.2 g/kg/d) vs usual protein/amino acid dosing (?1.2 g/kg/d) on clinical outcomes in nutritionally high risk ill patients.

Start: November 2017

Biomarkers, Genomics, Physiology in Critically Ill and ECMO Patients

Patients in end-stage cardiac failure and/or respiratory failure may be started on a rescue therapy known as Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO). One of the major clinical questions is how to manage the ventilator when patients are on ECMO therapy. Ventilator Induced Lung Injury (VILI) can result from aggressive ventilation of the lung during critical illness. VILI and lung injury such as Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) can further increase the total body inflammation and stress, this is known as biotrauma. Biotrauma is one of the mechanisms that causes multi-organ failure in critically ill patients. One advantage of ECMO is the ability to greatly reduce the use of the ventilator and thus VILI by taking control of the patient's oxygenation and acid-base status. By minimizing VILI during ECMO we can reduce biotrauma and thus multi-organ failure. Since the optimal ventilator settings for ECMO patients are not known, we plan to study the impact of different ventilator settings during ECMO on patient's physiology and biomarkers of inflammation and injury.

Start: April 2020

The Prognostic Impact of Selenium On Critical Surgical Patients

Selenium is an important trace element for human for its multiple roles such as the antioxidant activity. Previous evidences showed that critically ill patients may benefit from selenium supplement but the dose and results are controversial. Patients after operations for acute abdomen usually suffer from sepsis and stress. The aim of this study is to investigate the efficacy of selenium replacement in critical patients of acute abdomen, to see the impact on prognosis.

Start: December 2020

Family Care Conferences Criteria in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit

Multidisciplinary experts from two Pediatric Intensive Care Units (PICUs), used an iterative modified Delphi process to develop and refine criteria for determining PICU patients for whom a family care conference would be beneficial. In this study the investigators will assess the use of those criteria as a trigger to offer parents of PICU patients a family care conference.

Start: November 2020

Blend to Limit Oxygen in ECMO: A Randomised Controlled Registry Trial

To determine in patients requiring venoarterial (V-A) ECMO, whether the use of a conservative as compared with liberal oxygen strategy, results in a greater number of ICU-free days at day 60.

Start: September 2019

Extracorporeal Blood Purification Therapy in Critically Ill Patients (GlobalARRT)

Worldwide, the use of Extracorporeal Blood Purification (EBP) in everyday clinical practice is becoming increasingly common, particularly in critical care settings. The efficacy of most of these treatments on removal of inflammatory mediators is the main rationale behind the use of EBP in critically ill patients with multiorgan dysfunction. Nonetheless, there are still some doubts as to the clinical efficacy of bacterial toxins and cytokines removal and many clinical trials aiming at exploring the effect of EBP on long-term outcomes of septic patients have failed to demonstrate consistent results regarding 28 day- or hospital-mortality rates. The primary aim of this observational prospective web-based registry is to define the possible clusters of critically ill patients - treated with extracorporeal blood purification therapies worldwide - who are homogeneous regarding both clinical and treatment characteristics and seem to benefit the most from EBP.

Start: November 2020

Inulin for Infections in the Intensive Care Unit

Normal gut bacteria prevent colonization and subsequent infection with MDR organisms (MDROs) through competition for resources and other mechanisms. During critical illness, this function of the microbiome is lost and there are no current treatments to restore it. Preliminary data indicates that the prebiotic fiber inulin is safe and may alter the gastrointestinal microbiome to improve gut barrier function, decrease colonization with MDROs, and reduce downstream risk for intensive care unit (ICU)-acquired MDR infections. However, the impact of inulin during critical illness is unknown. This double-blind, randomized clinical trial will test inulin for the prevention of antibiotic resistant infections in the ICU. The trial's specific aims are to determine (1) the feasibility, tolerability, and safety of inulin in the intensive care unit; (2) the impact of inulin on gut colonization with antibiotic-resistant pathogens; and (2A/exploratory) the impact of inulin on ICU-acquired antibiotic-resistant infections.

Start: October 2019

Tight Versus Liberal Blood Glucose Control in Adult Critically Ill Patients

Critically ill patients usually develop hyperglycemia, which is associated with an increased risk of morbidity and mortality. Controversy exists on whether targeting normal blood glucose concentrations with insulin therapy, referred to as tight blood glucose control (TGC) improves outcome of these patients, as compared to tolerating hyperglycemia. It remains unknown whether TGC, when applied with optimal tools to avoid hypoglycemia, is beneficial in a context of withholding early parenteral nutrition. The TGC-fast study hypothesizes that TGC is beneficial in adult critically ill patients not receiving early parenteral nutrition, as compared to tolerating hyperglycemia.

Start: September 2018

Giving Information Systematically and Transparently in Lung and GI Cancer Phase 2

When advanced disease progresses, there comes a time when an oncologists must explain to their patients that they only have months left to live. During these discussions the oncologist attempts to explain to the patient their prognoses and what it means for them going forward. However our prior studies shown that even when patients only have months left to live, most do not understand that their cancer is incurable and that it is late/end-stage. Dying cancer patients who fully understand their prognosis are able to make more informed decisions and are therefore more likely to engage in advanced care planning, and receive care what in consistent with their values and preferences. They are also in a better position to avoid burdensome, non-beneficial care. The investigator developed Oncolo-GIST in order to help increase the number of patients who fully understand their prognosis and its implications. Oncolo-GIST is an intervention aimed at enhancing clinicians' communication with patients by teaching them to relay information both sensitively and using simple terminology. The Oncolo-GIST training will provide instruction in areas such as how to introduce the topic of prognosis (describe scan results as "worse"), how to phrase the prognosis itself ("likely months, not years"), how to explain expected treatment outcomes (e.g., "not expected to be cured by treatment") and how to describe expected treatments impact on quality of life - that is, whether the anticancer treatment is likely to make them feel overall better or worse. The training materials consist of a manual and a set of videos that act out situations described in the manual. The second phase of this study will be a randomized controlled trial. The investigator will recruit (n=50) adults with metastatic GI or lung cancers with scan results that reveal progression (worsened disease) on an initial systemic treatment; that is, patients whose life-expectancy can reliably be estimated to be months, not years. Medical oncologists (n=8) who care for these patients will also be consented for study participation and half (n=4) will be randomized to receive the Oncolo-GIST training. Patients will be assessed by trained research staff in the week prior to a scheduled meeting with their oncologist to discuss the scan results. This will provide patients' baseline levels of prognostic understanding and enable the investigator to determine how the intervention relates to pre-post scan visit changes in prognostic understanding. Patients will be assessed post-scan within a week of that progressive scan visit and then 2 and 4 months later. The assessment battery that will be administered at these time-points will measure the patient's degree of prognostic understanding, the primary outcome of the study. Other outcomes that will be measured by the assessment battery include the patients quality of life, therapeutic alliances of the patient, whether or not a DNR was ordered, the care received by the patient, whether or not the patient preferred greater quality of longer quantity of life, and whether or not the patients received "value-consistent" care.

Start: October 2020