Deep suctioning in bronchitis admission tied to longer stays

(HealthDay)—Deep suctioning used in the first 24 hours after a pediatric admission for bronchitis is associated with increased length of stays (LOS), according to a study published online March 4 in JAMA Pediatrics.

Grant M. Mussman, M.D., from the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, and colleagues retrospectively studied data from the electronic medical records of 740 infants (aged 2 to 12 months) hospitalized with bronchiolitis.

The researchers found that increased deep suction as a percentage of suction events was associated with increased LOS. For patients with no deep suction, the geometric mean of LOS was 1.75 days, compared to 2.35 days in patients with more than 60 percent deep suction. There was also an increased LOS in a dose-dependent manner, with an increased number of suctioning lapses with a geometric mean of 1.62 days in patients with no lapses compared to 2.64 days in patients with three or four lapses.

"For patients admitted with bronchiolitis, the use of deep suctioning in the first 24 hours after admission and lapses greater than four hours between suctioning events were associated with longer LOS," the authors write.