Airway & Vent Setup
This pressure range should be maintained in an endotracheal tube cuff to maintain airway patency while preventing tracheal damage.
What is 20–30 cm H₂O?
This is the primary purpose of ventilator graphics.
What is monitoring patient-ventilator interaction and lung mechanics?
This noninvasive device continuously measures arterial oxygen saturation.
What is a pulse oximeter?
This is the normal ratio of dead space to tidal volume in healthy adults.
What is 0.2–0.4 (about one-third)?
This is the medical definition of hypoxia.
What is inadequate oxygen available to tissues?
This type of pathogen is most frequently responsible for VAP.
What are gram-negative bacteria?
This is the most reliable method used to confirm proper endotracheal tube placement.
What is capnography or end-tidal CO₂ detection?
In volume ventilation with constant flow, the flow waveform appears as this shape.
What is a square (rectangular) waveform?
This monitoring method measures CO₂ levels in exhaled gas and produces a capnogram.
What is capnography?
This ventilator strategy allows elevated PaCO₂ to prevent lung injury from high ventilating pressures.
What is permissive hypercapnia?
This type of hypoxia occurs when hemoglobin levels are low or abnormal.
What is anemic hypoxia?
This positioning strategy reduces aspiration risk and VAP incidence.
hat is head-of-bed elevation (30–45°)?
These are the three key airway pressures that should be monitored during mechanical ventilation.
What are PIP, Plateau Pressure, and transairway pressure (PTA)?
What waveform can be used to assess airway resistance?
What is the flow waveform?
This instrument should be used to evaluate oxygenation in fire victims who may have carbon monoxide poisoning.
What is a CO-oximeter?
This condition is an absolute contraindication to permissive hypercapnia.
What is elevated intracranial pressure or head injury?
The primary goal of applying PEEP during mechanical ventilation is this.
What is alveolar recruitment and improved oxygenation?
This bundle of evidence-based practices is used to prevent ventilator-associated pneumonia.
What is the VAP bundle?
A rising PIP with an unchanged plateau pressure indicates this ventilatory problem.
What is increased airway resistance?
Auto-PEEP can be visually identified when this happens on the flow-time waveform.
What is expiratory flow failing to return to baseline before the next breath?
To measure plateau pressure accurately, inspiration should be held for this long.
What is 1–2 second?
Bronchodilator therapy should cause this change in ventilator parameters.
What is a decrease in PIP and an increase in PEFR?
This point on the pressure-volume curve represents the pressure needed to open collapsed alveoli.
What is the Lower Inflection Point (LIP)?
This common mechanism contributes to VAP when secretions leak around the ETT cuff.
What is microaspiration?
When setting a low-pressure alarm, it should typically be set this many cm H₂O below peak inspiratory pressure.
What is 10 cm H₂O below PIP?
This ventilator variable determines when inspiration begins during patient-triggered ventilation.
What is the trigger variable (pressure or flow trigger)?
This temperature range is required for accurate transcutaneous oxygen monitoring.
What is 42–44°C?
Positive pressure ventilation increases this hormone, often reducing urine output.
What is antidiuretic hormone (ADH)?
In ARDS patients, this positioning strategy improves oxygenation by recruiting posterior lung regions.
What is prone positioning?
The most effective treatment strategy for VAP includes this combination of therapies.
What are appropriate antibiotics and supportive care?
What are effective strategies to reduce Raw and improve ventilation?
What is suction, give a bronchodilator, ensure the ET tube is not kinked/being bitten.
This factor has the greatest influence on airway resistance within the respiratory system.
What is the airway radius (diameter of the airway)?
At this pulse oximetry value, the oxyhemoglobin dissociation curve begins to steepen significantly, making an arterial blood gas necessary to accurately confirm oxygenation.
What is less than 80%?
When suctioning an intubated patient, the suction catheter should be inserted only this far to avoid airway trauma.
What is until you meet resistance or the patient coughs?
Optimal PEEP is defined as the level that provides the best oxygenation with the least amount of this complication.
What is hemodynamic compromise (or decreased cardiac output)?
This type of bacterial organism is commonly associated with late-onset ventilator-associated pneumonia.
What is Pseudomonas aeruginosa?
This technique helps prevent cuff overinflation and tracheal necrosis when inflating an ETT cuff.
What is the minimal leak technique (MLT)?
What does the volume delivered depend on?
What is flow and inspiratory time?
Indirect calorimetry uses this ratio to determine which substrate is being metabolized.
What is the respiratory quotient (RQ)?
If alveolar ventilation is increased but respiratory acidosis persists, this physiologic problem is likely present.
What is increased dead space ventilation (e.g. P.E.)?
Inverse ratio ventilation intentionally makes inspiratory time longer than expiratory time, often producing this I:E ratio.
What is 2:1 or greater?
This preventive practice involves temporarily interrupting sedation to assess neurologic status and readiness for extubation.
What is a sedation vacation (daily sedation interruption)?
This type of cuff distributes pressure over a larger surface area to reduce tracheal injury.
What is a high-volume, low-pressure cuff?
In flow-cycled ventilation modes like PSV, inspiration ends when flow decreases to this percentage of peak flow.
What is approximately 25% of peak inspiratory flow?
This measurement obtained during the first 100 milliseconds of inspiration helps evaluate respiratory drive.
What is airway occlusion pressure (P0.1)?
Positive pressure ventilation can increase levels of this hormone, which may lead to decreased urine output.
What is antidiuretic hormone (ADH)?
When constructing a quasi-static pressure-volume curve to evaluate lung compliance and alveolar recruitment, the maximum airway pressure is typically limited to this value.
What is 40 cm H2O?
The mortality rate associated with VAP most strongly depends on these two factors rather than the infection itself.
What is the presence of an underlying disease and prior antimicrobial therapy.